Labour faces a threat in its heartlands from a former party councillor who is standing for Holyrood to protest against hospital closures.

Gaille McCann has stood down from Glasgow City Council, and was founder of the Mothers Against Drugs movement in the city's Cranhill area. She says she is "fed up" with Labour after 17 years as a member, and that it is against innovation and radical thinking.

Her intention is to stand on May 3 in Central Scotland for the NHS First party, which was formed last year. The aim is to punish Labour for closure of the accident and emergency services at Monklands General Hospital, though the seats to be targeted are not yet decided.

The party also received the backing of Glasgow-born Susan Wighton, an Aberdeen nurse who became famous for work with Palestinian refugees in Beirut during the 1980s, though there is no decision yet where she will stand.

Both women said yesterday they plan to campaign against service cutbacks and the use of private finance to build hospitals.

Mev Brown, a former Tory candidate in Edinburgh who works with homeless people, set up the party last year for the Moray by-election. Although it only won 2% of the vote there, he now wants to focus its activities on Monklands, where 50,000 people signed a petition to save the casualty department.

"Labour can ignore a petition with 50,000 names, but they can't ignore 50,000 votes," he said yesterday.

Labour MSPs and MPs around Monklands hospital, including Home Secretary John Reid, have campaigned against Lanarkshire Health Board's decision, fearing that they could face a threat at the ballot box.

They had been warned of the danger by the success of Dr Jean Turner, a retired GP, in ousting Labour from its safe Strathkelvin and Bearsden seat in 2003 over changes to Stobhill Hospital services.