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'The Scottish Labour campaign has also been dogged by the increasingly obvious split between Midlothian-based Martin and Glasgow-based Bill Miller, number three on the party list, who is expected to lose his seat, and who snubbed the party's campaign launch this month.' Alan Crawford in the Sunday Herald, 23 rd May 2003. |
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An extraordinary row between Scottish Labour candidates for the European parliament culminated in threats of legal action, Scotland on Sunday can reveal.
David Martin, the leading Scottish MEP, and the Deputy Speaker of the European Parliament, consulted lawyers with a view to stopping Labour's ballot for places on party lists.
The move followed claims that a rival MEP, Bill Miller, received an unfair advantage when an electoral message from him was sent to rank-and-file Labour Party members through the party's e-mail system.
The Labour Party has been forced to issue a belated clarification, stressing that the central party was not backing any individual candidate, and has allowed Martin and the other candidate in the European poll, Catherine Stihler, to e-mail their own election addresses.
Labour MEPs and would-be MEPs are currently battling for the highest places on the party lists in advance of European Parliament elections which will be held in June 2004.
The higher a candidate's position in the ballot of rank-and-file party members, the greater their chances of being elected to the European Parliament.
On October 22, the Scottish Labour Party's e-mail system sent members a message containing an election address from Bill Miller.
He said: "My pledge to you is that I will ensure the interests of the people of Scotland will be central in my efforts to achieve a fairer, more secure, prosperous and inclusive Europe for all its citizens."
Although the message was written by him personally, the e-mail appeared to users to have come from the Party's Scottish HQ in Glasgow.
The e-mail enraged supporters of Martin and Stihler, who claimed that the message would be seen as an official endorsement of Miller, who is close to Lesley Quinn - the General Secretary of the Scottish Party.
Martin declined to comment on the issue. However, a source close to him admitted that it was made known to the party that he was speaking to solicitors. It is understood that he considered an interim interdict against the party, which would have put the ballot on hold until each candidate had received a 'fair' opportunity to get their message to party members.
The source said: "No one is saying that David was the victim of a dark conspiracy, but the whole thing has been a complete balls-up.
"He did speak to lawyers. But in the event no legal action was necessary "
The Labour Party was forced to issue a clarification, which has been obtained by Scotland on Sunday.
It said: "We wish to make it clear the Scottish Labour Party does not endorse Bill Miller's or Catherine Stihler's candidacy and would be equally delighted if either David Martin, Bill Miller or Catherine Stihler appeared at number one on the list.
Bill Miller last night attempted to play down the affair. He said: "As far as I am concerned we have all had an opportunity to send out e-mails. At the end of the day, I expect us all to be elected, so from that point of view it does not really matter who is number one, or two, or three."
Stihler was unavailable for comment.
DAVID Martin's Labour colleagues in Europe have failed to publicly back him as he undergoes an investigation over allegations relating to his expenses.
While political opponents of Britain's most senior MEP showered him with praise and sympathy, Martin's fellow Labour MEPs for Scotland refused to come to his assistance.
Bill Miller MEP even suggested that the investigation now under way within the European parliament was insufficiently rigorous and that the Martin episode "tars all MEPs" with the same brush of suspicion.
"The problem we've got with the David Martin scenario is that the parliament's rules on all these [matters] are very lax because it has to accommodate 15 different political systems from 15 different countries, as well as 15 political cultures," said Miller.
It emerged last week that allegations relating to expenses had been made against Martin, senior vice-president of the European parliament, by his brother-in-law, Billy Cook. Martin is understood to be seeking a divorce from his wife - Cook's sister - and has recently had a baby with journalist Lorraine Davidson.
Miller, who is third on Labour's list for the elections to the European parliament on June 10, added: "Something like this obviously tars all MEPs.
"People don't distinguish and it affects the credibility of all MEPs. I don't know whether he is guilty or not guilty, IÕll leave that to the parliament to become judge of that ."
Catherine Stihler MEP, second on the Labour list, refused to return calls.
By contrast, MartinÕs political opponents went out of their way to note their "very high personal regard" for Martin .
LibDem MEP for Scotland Elspeth Attwooll said she had "a great deal of respect" for Martin, while SNP MEP Professor Sir Neil MacCormick said: "We are all innocent until proven guilty." Conservative MEP for Scotland John Purvis said he had "great sympathy" for MartinÕs plight.
A dangerous mixture of politics and personal animosity is threatening the career of one of Labour's fastest rising stars on the European stage. Political Editor Douglas Fraser and Alan Crawford look at the campaign to oust David Martin.
"It happens in families and friendships and other walks of life all the time," says one of those in the Labour Party who knows all the players in the David Martin story. "It's unfortunate and unpleasant. There's absolutely nothing political in this: it's entirely personal."
Personal, yes, but two months before Martin faces re-election both as Labour's lead candidate in the European elections and possibly straight after that as president of the European parliament, it cannot help but be intensely political.
Allegations made against him by his former brother-in-law, and now being investigated by the parliament authorities in Brussels, are that he claimed twice for the same office costs "over a period of time". Those allegations would appear to have behind them the most personal of motives.
David Martin married his wife Margaret before he was elected as a Lothian regional councillor in 1982. When he began a stellar career in Brussels and Strasbourg only two years later, she was the dutiful wife who brought up the kids in their Edinburgh home and helped run his Dalkeith office. She was a willing campaigner and could always be relied upon to knock on doors or stuff envelopes.
When they split, it was far from amicable, not least because it became clear that Martin had begun a relationship with a younger woman, Lorraine Davidson, a Daily Mirror journalist from Scotland who was working in Brussels. She is well known in the party too, having been Donald Dewar's spin doctor ahead of the 1999 election and, prior to meeting Martin, the partner of Labour MSP Tom McCabe. Davidson's son to Martin, born three months ago, was the recipient of much cooing at the Labour conference in Inverness in February.
That much is personal. What is now so political is that Margaret's brother Billy Cook, a Labour member in South Edinburgh, although not necessarily thought to be an activist, is understood last week to have handed over a sheaf of documents to the Scottish Labour headquarters in Glasgow, and made a verbal allegation that this represented proof of Martin having been on the fiddle. He was entitled to claim for office costs as an MEP and also as vice-president of the parliament, a post he has held since 1989, rising to his current position as senior vice-president - un grand fromage on the continent and Britain's most senior European parliamentarian, even though he is little-recognised in his native country.
One of those to have seen the documents says the evidence is not clear either way, or at least that only an accountant with expertise in the bizarre and often outrageous world of MEP expenses could make sense of it and reach a conclusion.
Martin has made clear that he expects to be cleared, and has described the accusations as "malicious". He hopes just as fervently that the investigation can be completed within three weeks, so that he can get on with the election campaign. And at Labour headquarters there is sufficient confidence in his position that a large print run of leaflets with his face and name prominent go to the printers in the middle of this week.
Indeed, it is notable that he is being treated more leniently than either George Galloway MP, who was suspended from the party pending an investigation into his statements in the run-up to the Iraq war, or former First Minister Henry McLeish, who had Labour Party approval as a candidate for the Holyrood elections withheld during the "Officegate" saga. Labour insists the cases are different: Galloway's was a Labour Party matter while McLeish had admitted to a muddle and police were investigating whether it was a fiddle. The allegations against Martin are being looked into by the European parliament.
A Labour Party source said the Martin case was "not particularly complicated". "All we can do is appeal to [the parliament authorities] to do this as quickly as they can. Assuming it cares about its image, the European parliament doesn't want to have this investigation hanging over its senior vice-president."
In an apparent coincidence last week, as allegations broke concerning Martin, Pat Cox the respected president of the European parliament made a robust statement on allegations of expense fraud. Speaking in the wake of allegations that German members were signing in to pick up their £175 daily allowance then leaving within the hour, Cox told MEPs they all had a duty to be accountable, but also to be fair.
"I refuse to accept, as president of this parliament, that we, the elected members of this house, suffer from some kind of collective guilt. We do not need to be presumed guilty if we do not individually establish our innocence." He said all substantial allegations would be investigated, adding: "But evidence-led it shall be, not prejudice-led."
He later refused to add anything specific about Martin, while Neil Kinnock, the EU Commissioner in charge of institutional reform, told the Sunday Herald that Martin was "a first-class hard-working MEP".
Yet from his Labour MEP colleagues Catherine Stihler and Bill Miller there has been scant support. It perhaps says as much about the Labour Party as the man himself that praise for Martin has been most fulsome from his political opponents.
Scots MEPs are a pretty close-knit bunch - with a camaraderie borne as much of the indifference, even antipathy, with which their work is regarded at home, as much as the early morning shuttle to Brussels each Monday. There is no doubt that MEPs feel aggrieved at the limelight suddenly being thrust upon them as soon as there is a whiff of scandal, when the constant drip of press releases they issue go largely unheeded. However, a number of Martin's political opponents went out of their way to note their "very high personal regard" for him.
But Stihler refused to comment at all, while Miller suggested the parliament was not capable of investigating the allegations thoroughly enough.
On the face of it, Miller could gain from Martin's misfortune. He is third on the Labour list after Martin and Stihler, and with the number of Scottish seats falling, he knows he would be lucky to be re-elected. If Martin is forced to withdraw, Miller would be much more likely to win from second place. As long as Martin remains top of the list, however, Miller stands to lose from the negative publicity. Some within Labour ranks regard the allegations as having the potential to lower the overall Labour vote at the forthcoming elections, perhaps to the extent of making it hard for the party to retain two, let alone three, MEPs.
Conservative MEP John Purvis said that expenses and concern at potential abuse of the system was likely to become an election issue, even though "most of the parliament" was in favour of reform. MEPs voted for reform earlier this year, but the move was defeated by member states concerned at the high level of salary proposed to replace the expenses system.
"I don't think any of the present MEPs in Scotland would disagree that we want reform," Purvis said.
MEPs receive the same salary as an MP in each member state, in the case of the UK £55,000 a year. On top of that, every MEP is eligible for the £175 daily allowance and a general allowance of some £2500 a month for expenses in the constituency, such as office costs. A further sum of up to around £100,000 a year is available for secretarial support, however this is not paid to an MEP directly but goes to an agent or the staff themselves. A sum of around £2000 a year is also available for travel to other countries on MEP business.
The most contentious element is the travel allowance. This involves a calculation from an MEP's home to the nearest airport and on to Brussels or Strasbourg based on a fully transferable air ticket. MEPs must only submit a boarding pass, not a receipt, in order to receive the full amount, whatever the actual cost of the ticket.
Liberal Democrat MEP for Scotland Elspeth Attwooll said that Scots MEPs were "all very upset" over the issue of expenses, but insisted there was a lot of misleading information on the matter.
"We do all work very, very hard indeed. The idea that it's a gravy train and we spend our time having a riotous time in Brussels is far from the truth."
A campaign group set up after the last European elections is meanwhile urging all election candidates to sign up to a voluntary Campaign for Parliament Reform (CPR). A key plank of the CPR is a transparent system of pay and expenses for MEPs. To date, four of the eight Scots MEPs have signed up, with Martin unable to sign because of his senior vice-president role.
That is not the only part of David Martin's political position which sets him apart. He occupies something of a strange position within Labour, with a reputation as an uncomplicated, bright and able politician, perhaps a bit short of Blairesque charisma, but his European base has kept him well away from the party's grubbier, back- stabbing tendencies. His strong criticism of the Blair government's approach to Europe - making deals with leaders on the right in Spain and Italy to water down labour law in particular - has shown him to be independently minded. He told the Sunday Herald last year that Labour risked "a massive bloody nose" at the forth coming European elections unless the government was "more persistent and consistent" in championing Europe.
Martin has not gone native in Brussels and Strasbourg. He speaks only a word or two of French. He has regretted losing his Lothian constituency to a pan-Scottish representation required of all eight Scottish MEPs since 1999. And since then, despite his success there and the trappings of a very comfortable political life, he has twice tried to progress his career by getting out of European politics.
He sought the Midlothian seat at Westminster when it was vacated ahead of the 2001 election, but was outmanoeuvred by the ex-mining fraternity. And when he tried to stand for the Strathkelvin and Bearsden vacancy in the Scottish parliament in 2001, Gordon Brown, the Chancellor, intervened, invoking a party rule against such a move. This was not seen as a particular attack on Martin's credentials or politics, but more a brazen move to install a Brown loyalist, Brian Fitzpatrick, as the candidate, who was duly elected.
By contrast, the allegations levelled at Martin would appear to have everything to do with toppling him from the political position he now occupies. In three weeks, his accusers will find out whether they have been successful.
A CAMPAIGN by Scotland's most senior MEP to become president of the European Parliament took a fresh knock yesterday after his fellow Labour MEPs recommended someone else for the job.
David Martin did not put himself forward for the vote by the outgoing European Parliamentary Labour party, since he is being investigated over the running of his office finances.
The EPLP instead gave its backing to Terry Wynn, the MEP for the North West of England.
However, it is far from certain that Mr Martin would have been endorsed even if he had stood for the presidency.
Although the recommendation is not binding on the MEPs who will make up the new EPLP after the June European elections, it will carry substantial weight.
Mr Martin said last night that he still intended to put himself forward as a presidential candidate at the formal contest in June.
Because of a deal with the other socialist parties in Europe, whoever is chosen as the EPLP's presidential candidate has a very strong chance of winning the post.
The parliament's socialist group is expected to supply the president in the first half of the 2004-09 parliament.
As this would coincide with the UK's presidency of the EU and the British referendum on the new EU constitution, it would place a UK Labour president in a powerful position.
The result of Wednesday's internal EPLP vote is another blow for Mr Martin, MEP for Lothians and a vice-president of the parliament, who was accused last month of irregularities regarding office expenses, which led to an inquiry being carried out.
He has denied any wrongdoing, and said he expects to be cleared by the investigation by the parliament's finance director, which is expected to return initial findings in a few weeks.
Mr Martin was the socialist group candidate for president in 2002 but lost out to Pat Cox, who was the candidate of the Liberal group.
THE Tories' European election manifesto launch was wrecked yesterday when a senior party figure was caught up in a row over expenses.
Struan Stevenson admitted taking advantage of an expenses system that lets members of the European Parliament claim a £180-a-day living allowance. He was identified by a BBC journalist as an MEP who signed in at Brussels to qualify for the allowance, then left the building soon afterwards saying he was heading for his constituency.
While the practice does not break any rules, the controversy overshadowed Michael Howard's Scottish launch of his party's European election campaign. The manifesto included the hostage to fortune that "reimbursement of MEPs' expenses must be fully transparent".
It is the latest in a series of similar accusations levelled against several MEPs, who can claim the allowance on top of their £58,000 salary and other general operating expenses. It came as official figures released yesterday revealed that Westminster MPs were paid, on average, £175,000 in 2002-03 in salaries, costs and allowances.
Mr Stevenson, the latest in a series of MEPs to be logged signing in and flying home, said he was doing nothing wrong and that his party wanted the system reformed. He defended his actions on the grounds that it was a device to allow some MEPs to get round their lack of expenses to travel around within their constituencies.
Mr Howard, the Tory leader, was furious that the row undermined the Scottish leg of his three-nations campaign launch, and in his anger he curbed attempts by journalists to question him on the issue.
Mr Stevenson was also furious about it being raised in this way. But the whole issue left the Tories exposed regarding the party's campaign against the gravy train at Brussels.
When Mr Howard and his entourage arrived at Murrayfield to launch the campaign, it was questions over European allowances that dominated.
Mr Stevenson, as one of the Tories' two Scottish MEPs, was among the star speakers, and the first question to Mr Howard asked how this could be squared with the episode reported by the BBC.
Mr Howard said: "I think the arrangement for pay and expenses in the European Parliament should be changed, exactly as our manifesto. It's worth adding that there are moves afoot to increase the pay of MEPs and reduce the tax they pay and British Conservative MEPs have been in the vanguard of opposing those proposals."
Mr Howard told another questioner who asked if he would order his MEPs not to accept allowances or a pay rise: "No, we will be arguing for changes to the way expenses are paid and we will be opposing reforms that would increase pay and reduce taxes."
When it was put to the Tory leader that the public viewed the system as a gravy train he retorted: "The way to change the gravy train is to do precisely what I've suggested."
Leaving the room, Mr Howard refused to say whether he had discussed the issue with Mr Stevenson, and then the Scots MEP himself rounded angrily on Hans-Peter Martin, the Austrian MEP who has been campaigning against signing in and leaving.
BBC Radio 4's Today programme described how Mr Stevenson had signed on, then left the building within an hour saying he had constituency business to attend to. He told the programme: "It's absolutely perfectly eligible that anyone can do this every day."
Asked for his name, he told the reporter: "That's something you will have to find."
At Murrayfield, Mr Stevenson told reporters that MEPs last year voted overwhelmingly in favour of reforming the system of pay expenses, but the reform was vetoed by the German government.
He said: "We are therefore left with a system that requires MEPs to sign in on a daily basis and be treated like schoolchildren in order to get the necessary allowance to cover our rent for our accommodation.
"The only reason the members' registry opens at 7am is to facilitate those MEPs who are leaving for the airport. To somehow claim this is an abuse of the system is outrageous."
The curse of the manifesto launch struck the Tories yesterday when an embarrassing row over expenses fiddles all but scuppered the unveiling of their Euro-election campaign.
Political parties often have nightmare starts to their electioneering, and the Scottish Conservatives seem more susceptible than most. During the general election three years ago they unveiled a huge poster in Edinburgh's Princes Street. It should have read "Vote Tory" but instead read: "Shop at Tesco's".
Yesterday's high profile visit by Michael Howard to Scotland and his no doubt stirring words about Europe were knocked into a cocked hat by allegations that Struan Stevenson, the party's leading Scottish member of the European Parliament, had been claiming expenses for meetings in Brussels he hadn't attended.
Rumours that Mr Stephenson had first attracted suspicious glances when he was seen leaving the European Parliament building carrying a bag marked "Swag" were apparently wide of the mark.
The MEP's vociferous denials yesterday were almost convincing. I say "almost" because when he claimed that the whole system of expenses in the European Parliament needed urgent reform he was speaking nothing less than the truth. That does not, I am afraid, excuse his profiting from that system.
Struan Stevenson is not a corrupt man. But no amount of forthright explanation from himself and others masked the salient fact that he has been the beneficiary of a shady system.
He was accused on the Today programme of signing the MEPs' register that declared he was attending meetings in the Belgian capital but then, one hour later, flying back to Scotland while still pocketing the 262 euros (roughly £180) per day expenses for meals and subsistence in Brussels.
Mr Stevenson said he had been traduced and that the allowance, which also covered his accommodation costs in Brussels, was claimed by everyone.
This answer, however, only begged further questions - the obvious one being that just because everyone else claimed it, did that make it right for Mr Stevenson to do it, too? And if he was legitimately claiming for his accommodation costs, why did he not pay back that part of the allowance that related to meals in Brussels that he didn't eat?
One MSP, who was not unsympathetic to Mr Stevenson's predicament, nevertheless asked whether the MEP would be happy to pay one of his farm labourers a full day's pay if that man turned up at 8am but then cleared off an hour later.
There is no doubt that the incident marred Mr Howard's election launch, certainly the Scottish end of it, and it was significant that he answered questions about Mr Stevenson's little difficulty with a series of non-answers.
Miffed he most certainly was, especially as one of the supposedly strongest suits in the Tory Euro-election campaign is a root and branch reform of MEPs' pay and expenses.
The best thing that could be said for the Conservatives yesterday was that they realised that they'd had a bad day and took their ill luck on the chin.
Europe was very much on the agenda in the Scottish Parliament, too, when Nicola Sturgeon trumpeted her passionate pro-Europe credentials, while insisting that the SNP would vote against the planned EU constitution if it entrenched Brussels' control of fishing.
In a well-worked speech she did, however, sound much like the Tories when she said: "Being pro-European does not mean that you have to accept everything that comes out of Brussels."
The Executive response from Andy Kerr, the finance minister, was truly dire. He read out virtually every word and not for nothing did the SNP's Fergus Ewing ask from his customary sedentary position: "Who wrote this drivel?"
Jack McConnell and John Swinney had an ill-natured clash on the same issue. The former ridiculed the SNP leader's internal troubles but said that the national interest had to be put ahead of the nationalist interest.
For his part, Mr Swinney accused his tormentor of sabotaging a deal on fisheries between his party and the Foreign Office, simply to deny the SNP a political success.
And we've still got six week to go . . .
Labour's European election campaign was in disarray yesterday when civil war broke out between the party's two most senior Scottish MEPs over allegations that thousands of pounds of expenses have been misused in Brussels.
An extraordinary row between David Martin, the European Parliament Vice-President, and Bill Miller, the second most senior Scottish Labour MEP, overshadowed the launch of Scottish Labour's European election campaign. Mr Miller claimed he had received a letter from the Vice-President's lawyer implying he was responsible for allegations that Mr Martin has improperly used his allowances.
Mr Miller failed to turn up at the campaign launch in Glasgow, but later attacked his colleague when he revealed he had received the letter. "His (Mr Martin's) lawyers have written to me asking if I have access to his accounts," Mr Miller said.
Mr Martin is top of the constituency list in Scotland whereas Mr Miller is third and in danger of losing his seat given that the number of Scottish MEPs is to fall from eight to seven.
Mr Miller denied he had provided the documents of details of Mr Martin's financial arrangements that have resulted in the European Parliament investigating his allowances. "The information that the party got came from, as far as I'm aware, Billy Cook. There is no way I could get hold of that information," he said.
Billy Cook, an Edinburgh Labour activist, is the brother of Mr Martin's estranged wife, Margaret. Mr Cook handed details of Mr Martin's expenses to the Labour Party and they were passed on the European Parliament.
In 2002, Mr Martin left his wife for Lorraine Davidson, a former Labour spindoctor and Daily Mirror journalist.
"I have seen all the speculation," Mr Miller said. "Why don't people concentrate on whether David Martin is innocent or guilty? Has he committed what he is supposed to have done or not?" He also denied that the prospect of his losing his seat on June 10 would have given him a motive to undermine Mr Martin's campaign. "I have always known my job is on the line. I knew that when I went down to number three.
"All this stuff is being made up by journalists and David Martin's partner is a journalist with contacts. It is a distraction from the real issue which is, has David Martin fraudulently siphoned money through his expenses? If he has not, then fine. If he has he will have to be dealt with."
Mr Miller said that he missed the campaign launch because he had a "personal engagement" looking after his young daughter.
Mr Martin has repeatedly maintained he is innocent of misusing his expenses and has vowed to step down as an MEP if the investigation finds him guilty.
At the launch, Mr Martin claimed he was the victim of vendetta to damage his reputation. In front of Jack McConnell, the First Minister, and Alistair Darling, the Scottish Secretary, Mr Martin said he wanted to concentrate on campaigning.
"I think there is a problem that if you are in public office and public life, it's easy to make allegations and it can sometimes be quite difficult to disprove them, and that is the dilemma that I faced over the last five weeks," he said.
Earlier this month, it appeared that Mr Martin had been cleared but then more evidence was submitted to European officials.
Labour can expect to get a kicking from the electorate at the June 10 European elections, according to the party's most senior MEP.
David Martin, who is at the top of Scottish Labour's country-wide list in the proportional vote, has admitted that Iraq is the biggest issue with voters, and it is playing badly: "They all want to talk about what's happening in Iraq and obviously what's happening with the prisoners is a hot issue. The mood of the electorate is that even popular governments need to get kicked in midterms." He conceded that this was "an extremely difficult time for us".
Martin's views chime with an admission yesterday from Patricia Hewitt, the trade and industry secretary, who said that the Iraq war was turning women voters in particular away from Labour.
Martin, senior vice-president of the European parliament with 20 years' experience, has been speaking to the Sunday Herald for the first time since his re-election campaign nearly came off the rails.
Allegations about expenses fiddling were understood to be linked to his acrimonious marriage break-up. Facing an investigation, his fellow Labour MEPs failed to back him, despite opposition politicians rallying to their parliamentary colleague.
Even when cleared, Labour failed to give him wholehearted support, fearing that additional information would weaken his position. In fact, new information was handed to the parliamentary authorities earlier this month, and now Martin awaits an auditor to be appointed for another probe of his accounts. He has promised the party he will stand down if any wrong-doing is found.
The Scottish Labour campaign has also been dogged by the increasingly obvious split between Midlothian-based Martin and Glasgow-based Bill Miller, number three on the party list, who is expected to lose his seat, and who snubbed the party's campaign launch this month.
Speaking for the first time about the expenses investigation, Martin said: "I'm just putting that completely behind me. It has not been a comfortable or pleasant experience, but I have been sustained by the fact I know there's not a problem.
"The very reason that the information has been drip fed suggests the motive of the people that have been doing this. If you make a genuine complaint, you give the investigating authorities all the information at the beginning. This has been an attempt to undermine me in the public eye."
Unusually Š particularly during an election campaign - Martin praises opposition party candidates for their reaction to the scandal, saying they have not tried to use it against him at the hustings: "They have all been very supportive personally. It is a great credit that they have not tried to make political capital out of any of this."
The lack of support from Bill Miller is brushed aside, though Martin has given up trying to explain the Glaswegian's no-show at the party launch.
What he implies is that their rivalry is largely personal. "I don't see politics as being about personality. In terms of the issues, we are able to work very well as part of the Labour team. We have the same objectives in what we want to achieve. We have no problem in relation to the issues."
But Martin concedes that the scandal claims have damaged his position as favourite to take over the presidency of the European parliament. He is no longer the socialist group candidate for the top job, though he claims to have strong support from the right, amid the complex deals being done between the parties to share out the jobs.
With the Prime Minister's sudden shift towards a ref erendum on the proposed European constitution, Martin called on Tony Blair to come out "all guns blazing" on its merits. "If they try to be equivocal in any way, that will make the task of getting a 'yes' vote almost impossible. They have to be strongly in favour of the final deal. They want a constitution they can defend, and they have to come out and sell whatever deal they can sign up to without reservation."
That means countering "incredibly opportunistic" opposition attacks on Europe, including what he says is inaccurate "black propaganda" about harmonised taxes and UK troops required to fight for the EU.
Amid fears that Labour could sink from their present three out of eight Scottish seats to only one out of the reduced seven-strong representation, Martin is confident that at least two seats can be held. And he warns the SNP they could be beaten by the Tories into second place in their share of the vote.
The Scottish National Party was today launching its campaign for the European elections, with the goal of emerging from the poll with more votes than any other party in Scotland.
The SNP was only 14,000 votes behind Labour in the 1999 European elections, and leader John Swinney believes it can overtake them on June 10, despite disappointments in subsequent ballots.
He claimed the SNP could best protect Scotland's national interests, such as the fishing industry, and asserted: "Only votes for the SNP are votes for Scotland".
Mr Swinney told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: "Our greatest concern is to make sure that the SNP emerges as the leading party in the elections in Scotland.
"We came very close to winning the European elections five years ago north of the border, only 14,000 votes behind Labour.
"I am appealing to the people of Scotland to make this election an opportunity to vote for Scotland and vote for the national interests of Scotland and assert those interests on the international stage."
The poll would give voters an opportunity to let Prime Minister Tony Blair know they do not support his decision to go to war in Iraq, which the SNP opposed, said Mr Swinney.
He added: "Voters must understand that if they want anyone to listen to the views of Scotland, they must vote for the SNP, because only votes for the SNP are votes for Scotland."
POLLSTERS are predicting that next month's European elections could result in a historic three-way tie in Scotland.
Research conducted by Strathclyde University has concluded that the SNP, the Tories and Labour are likely to finish neck-and-neck on June 10.
Their research is the only work being done in advance of the vote, as there are no polls being undertaken.
In 1999, in the previous European elections, Labour won 28% of the vote, the SNP 27% and the Tories 21%.
The research suggests that, with the Conservatives benefiting from a revival and both the SNP and Labour struggling to assert themselves, all three parties are likely to end up with 25%.
The pollsters even believe that a Tory victory in Scotland on June 10 is possible.
Professor of politics and Strathclyde University, John Curtice, said: "In the two UK-wide polls that are running, the Tories are currently running five points higher than in 1999. If they could record that level of increase on their 1999 Euro vote in Scotland they would be almost at 25%."
SCOTTISH Tories were dealt a major blow today by an opinion poll claiming they could lose one or both of their European Parliament seats to the UK Independence Party.
The YouGov survey found Conservative support north of the Border had fallen from 20 per cent at the last Euro elections in 1999 to just 11 per cent now.
And it claimed the UKIP - which wants Britain to pull out of the European Union - had come from nowhere to equal the Tory rating.
YouGov said most of the UKIP's new support came from disaffected Conservative voters. A quarter of those who said they would vote Tory at a general election are set to transfer their backing to the UKIP for the European election on Thursday.
And that could hand one of the Tories' two seats to English businessman Peter Troy, who is top of the UKIP list.
If the dramatic surge continued, the UKIP could take both seats.
The Tories today insisted they had run a good campaign and were content to wait for the results of the "real poll". A spokesman said: "There are 48 hours to go. We are campaigning on the right issues with the right message and we are confident we will do well."
The poll also had bad news for SNP leader John Swinney, who has set his party the target of overtaking Labour in share of the vote. The SNP was less than two per cent behind last time, but YouGov found the gap opening to six per cent, with Nationalist support dropping from 27 per cent to 21 per cent, while Labour's dipped from 29 to 27 per cent.
The figures suggested Labour would hold on to two of its current three seats - the best it could expect with Scotland's total seats being cut from eight to seven.
But if YouGov is right, the Scottish Nationalists are in danger of losing one of their two seats.
The findings suggest the Liberal Democrats would retain their one seat and give the Greens and Scottish Socialists little chance of winning anything.
The poll showed Labour ahead on 27 per cent (down two points from 1999); the SNP on 21 per cent (down six); Lib Dems on 13 per cent (up two); the Tories on 11 per cent (down nine); the UKIP on 11 per cent (up ten); the Greens on six per cent (as before); and the Scottish Socialists on six per cent (up two).
SCOTLAND'S Tories last night brushed aside poll findings which suggested the United Kingdom Independence party (UKIP) could deprive them of one or both of their European parliamentary seats.
As support for the anti-EU party continued to surge, and with just 48 hours to go before the polls close, David McLetchie, the Scottish Conservative leader, said: "We have spent the last five years proving opinion polls wrong. I have no doubt that on Thursday we can do so again."
The YouGov poll suggested UKIP has made a major breakthrough north of the border. At the last European elections in 1999, the UK-wide party, which wants Britain to pull out of the EU completely, polled a mere 1% of Scottish votes, but the latest snapshot put it at 11%, a level where it could take one of the seven Brussels seats on offer. If its surge continued, it could even pick up two.
At its current 11%, UKIP is level-pegging with the Tories, who have plunged from the 20% they achieved in Scotland five years ago. The poll also suggested that far from making gains at Labour's expense, the Scottish Nationalists are faring badly at 21%, six points down on their performance last time.
Like Mr McLetchie, John Swinney, the SNP leader, played down the latest survey, insisting tomorrow's Euro-poll was a straightforward two-horse race between Labour and his party.
He said: "Only the SNP can defeat Labour as the Tories fight it out for fifth place. The people of Scotland have a huge opportunity on Thursday to vote for Scotland with the SNP and reject a Labour party that is becoming more tawdry by the day."
The YouGov figures placed Labour on 27% down two points from 1999, the Liberal Democrats up three to 13%, the Greens unchanged at 6% and the Scottish Socialist party up from 4% to 6%. Last night, Peter Troy, the lead UKIP Euro-candidate in Scotland, told The Herald the latest poll was very encouraging. "We're finding traditional Labour, LibDems and Tories are saying they are not against Europe but enough is enough, that this is as far as we want to go."
A UK-wide Populus poll in The Times yesterday suggested 57% of Tory voters backed UKIP's policy of EU withdrawal. Overall, UKIP was put at 13%, up six, Labour at 26%, down two, the Tories on 24%, down 12, and the Lib Dems with 18%, up five.
Mr Troy said UKIP was likely to take votes from all the main parties but that the Conservatives would feel it the most. "I think Michael Howard is going to be more upset than Tony Blair," he added.
Indeed, today the Tory leader will use a last-ditch plea in the pages of the Daily Telegraph to appeal to traditional Conservative voters not to jump ship to UKIP.
Having already invoked the spirit of Margaret Thatcher to sound tough on the EU, Mr Howard yesterday underlined his party's "passionate" opposition to the proposed European constitution, accusing Mr Blair of making "huge concessions" on Europe.
Labour accused the Tories of panicking and continued to goad them over the outburst of Roger Helmer, the Conservative MEP facing a challenge from UKIP leading light Robert Kilroy-Silk, who suggested the Tories should adopt a policy of wide-ranging disengagement from EU law.
Gary Titley, leader of Labour's MEPs, said: "There must now be a question-mark over how many Tory MEPs will stay in the party unless Michael Howard immediately announces his intention to follow UKIP's policy of withdrawal from Europe."
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