After snakes and grubs, Kezia Dugdale steps out of the jungle into the bearpit

The Christmas pantomime season started a few weeks early in Scotland. The star attraction was a young political leader who abruptly resigned her post. Kezia Dugdale, 36, former leader of the Labour party in Scotland, then popped up a few months later in the Australian jungle amid the C-listers of ITV’s I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!

In the vivid 20-year history of the reconvened Scottish parliament, no story has been as bizarre as this. Instead of campaigning for Labour, Dugdale was eating grubs, walking with snakes and jousting with Boris Johnson’s dad.

The financial package that lured Dugdale into risking her entire political career has been the source of speculation, as has been the portion of it she will donate to charity, as she had initially declared. There have been reports that she negotiated a six-figure package for her stint. If so, then she may soon require every penny of it. For when she returns to Scotland to face the music, she may find herself having to consider a future outside of politics.

Senior Scottish Labour sources have indicated that all options remain open to the party about how to deal with Dugdale’s lucrative stint in the jungle. “There is still a lot of anger and disappointment around about Kezia’s decision, and there is a distinct possibility that she will face a disciplinary procedure,” said one.

Dugdale will be asked to expand on her initial justification for agreeing to participate in the show. When the news was first broken, many of her disbelieving colleagues thought it was the output of a fake social media account. Their initial fury seems not to have abated. Jenny Marra, a Labour MSP and personal friend of Dugdale, tweeted: “Election to parliament is a privilege to serve and represent people. It’s not a shortcut to celebrity.”

At the time, Dugdale responded to the criticism by claiming that being on the show would give her a unique opportunity to talk about socialism to a global audience. However, fans of I’m a Celebrity who tuned in to watch her crawling with snakes and eating kangaroos’ testicles claim to have seen little evidence of Dugdale banging the drum for international workers’ rights.

The senior Labour source added: “Some of us will want to ask her how she managed to spread the Labour message while she was down under. We saw precious little of it on the show.”

On the douce streets of Edinburgh on Saturday there were mixed reactions to Dugdale’s jungle foray among voters in her Lothian constituency. Willie Duff, a 63-year-old university technician from Newhaven in Edinburgh said: “What I want to know is how much is she giving to charity and what percentage. And who was representing her constituents when she was away?”

Thomas Lenaghan, a construction specialist and Labour party member, said: “People always accuse our politicians of being out of touch. So, best of luck to her – she’s giving her three weeks’ MSP’s salary to a good charity, as well as a portion of her fee. So what’s not to like?”

There is also a real-life tale of romance across Scotland’s bitter political divide underpinning Dugdale and her jungle shenanigans. The former Labour leader this year announced her engagement to Jenny Gilruth, a rising star of the SNP, the party that has become Labour’s most implacable enemy in Scotland. Political observers say that the couple are devoted to each other, and Gilruth has been gallantly defending her partner in the pages of the Daily Record Scottish tabloid in a column that ran for the duration of Dugdale’s three-week stretch in the jungle.

Some informed speculation has linked Dugdale’s resignation of the leadership in August with her romance and, subsequently, her decision to participate in a celebrity game show. One party activist said: “I would not be in the least bit surprised if Kezia took the money, knowing that her days in the party are numbered.”

Dugdale is not the first serving politician to have appeared on celebrity reality shows. Nadine Dorries was suspended by the Tory party in 2012 after she went on I’m a Celebrity without informing the chief whip, and her Conservative colleague, Penny Mordaunt, now international development secretary, appeared in Splash! in 2014. The most notorious example was George Galloway, who as the Respect party leader, entered the Big Brother house in 2006. Only he knows why he agreed to squeeze into a red catsuit and pretend to lap milk from a bowl on actress Rula Lenska’s knee.

Galloway, though, is also known for his political comebacks, and the opprobrium he attracted for that stunt simply slid off him as he returned unscathed to the political fray. It remains to be seen if Dugdale, a universally liked politician, possesses Galloway’s reserves of chutzpah and bloody-mindedness to come back from this.