THE civil war within Scotland's far left grew last night after another leading Scottish Socialist party member defected to Tommy Sheridan's new Solidarity movement.

Jock Penman, a former Scottish Socialist party regional organiser, declared he would be joining Sheridan, weeks after having given evidence in the ex-SSP leader's favour.

Penman told the court during the sensational libel case against the News of the World that Sheridan had "emphatically denied" having attended a swingers club in Manchester.

The far left movement now stands riven with discord. Last week Sheridan and Socialist MSP Rosemary Byrne, who has also quit the SSP, sat away from their former colleagues at the Scottish parliament, and were also moved out of their parliamentary offices, in order to keep away from the former political friends.

"I'm looking forward, not back," he said. "The SSP was a failed experiment and we can learn from those lessons and build a real socialist movement across Scotland."

Solidarity is drawing most of its membership from the north of the country. Eight candidates in the northeast of Scotland have joined them from the SSP.

But the SSP today accused Sheridan of overplaying his support, and said that the majority of members have remained with it. They believe that around 80% of the SSP membership will stay with them.

A SSP spokesman said today: "Despite much hyping by Mr Sheridan, the fact is that the vast, overwhelming majority of SSP members have chosen to stay in the SSP.

"It's one thing having candidates, but another having activists all over the country ready to fight an election. We will do that," the spokesman said.

That ended in victory for Sheridan - who sued over allegations about his private life. He claimed he had been a victim of the "mother of all stitch-ups".

Lothian and Borders police has received a complaint from a member of the public over the evidence given in court. The judge in the case, Lord Turnbull, had earlier indicated that there could be a case for perjury charges.

The police are now waiting on the verdict of the Crown Office, which is currently studying the case to see whether it is worth prosecuting any of the witnesses.

Party chiefs have seized on a poll last week which shows it on 6% - the same as its 2003 showing - to claim that it may still recover from the turmoil of the summer.

Tommy Sheridan's new Socialist party of Judea oh sorry Solidarity movement. Is lead by a liar and cheat or 11 members of the SSP lied in a court of law. I believe the SSP members told the truth.

well I'll be voting for Sheridan's new party Solidarity. I used to be an SNP voter but their march to the right has mirrored that of the Labour Party. A party that I was a member of for over 12 years. The 4 big parties accept the rule of the so-called free market that. They all dance to the tune of big business. The SNP want to give even bigger tax cuts to big business. The same businesses that exploit every loophole going to avoid paying their fair share.

The SSP leadership refuse to face reality. Do they really believe 80% of the membership are staying with them? Why then did only about 350 people turn up to their rally on Saturday 2nd, and twice that number turn up to the Solidarity launch the following day?

a vote for any of the 4 main parties is a wasted vote, careerists the lot of them. they wear the same suits making the same speeches, soundbites and spin.

Dugald - I'd day that is capitalism you are describing that consigns people to poverty and alienation. Capitalism has well outlived its usefulness by at least 100 years. Socialism hasn't existed anywhere in the world...yet.

What amazed me was the sheer lack of evidence the NOW had for the court case. It seemed that it was either very sloppy journalism or arrogance that a small time politician could actually take them to court and win. Are we really to believe that TS went with a NOW journalist to a swingers party. Where was the basic vidoes, photos or tapes of conversations these papers normally have when carrying out sting type operations. TS would have been particularly trusting to go with a NOW journalist. Just seems abit fishy to me. The 2 women he was meant to have accompanied both gave different stories of the events inside the party. The insident in the Glasgow hotel he has a good alibi, his father in law at a stag night. It does see to difficult for the police to check with everyone else that was meant to have attented the stag party in a pub. The allegations of an affair need some evidence to back them up. It is simply not good enough for a prostitute to allege a 4 yr affair without something to back it up. At the end the day she was trying to make money out the story and therefore compromises her position. The NOW also admitted they published part of her story which they new to be a pack of lies. (that he was a coke head). By rowing back so publically and ruining the creditibilty of it own witness. (does not mean that some or all is not true just that one side, NOW, something to back up its story to give it any creditabilty).

It seems that the case of NOW was so poor that is why the anti TS SSP has got involved in the whole case. Obviously we in the public do not really know what went on in that meeting. One side or the other is lying.

Good on yer, Dugald #6 - The SSP, Solidarity, SWP and all the other Loony Trots are a ragbag bunch of economic illiterates and fantasists. 5 years of their policies - God help us - and we'd be in the same state as Cuba or North Korea. Let them keep howling at the moon though, it's an amusing bit of Political Cabaret. Tommy's Ma grabbing the microphone like that embarrassing old uncle who always turns up at a Wedding, for example.

Interesting points, Alan #10 - most of the evidence at the 'trial' was about what Tommy said or didn't say at a meeting that did or didn't take place, and that may or may not have been minuted. If you strip away all the Peoples Popular Revolutionary Front of Judea paranoid nonsense, there was little evidence of the actual/alleged activities. I'm not a conspiracy theorist (much!) but howzabout the arch-stinger News of the Screws actually fell into a sting trap themselves. 'Somebody' set a Fox running, NoW gave chase, caught it and it blew up in their Editorial face. Just a thought.

Teaching pupils how to handle money, to buget, to save and invest would be of more benefit than the current pc lobby who want to give the pill to twelve year olds and promote homosexuality.

Teaching young people about success and how to achieve it would be of greater use than comprehensive dumbing down and lowest common denominator education.

#13 Dugald, while you are praying to your God that socialism fails, many hundreds of thousands of people all over the world are praying to their God for basic necessities of life (food, water, housing, jobs, peace etc) - these are things that capitalism cannot deliver to everyone because it is based on competition, inequality, division and expoitation.

No amount of teaching individuals about "success" can override the effects of a class system that ensures that kids from working families are at a disadvantage in our society (even having lower average birth weights). Capitalism cannot deliver success for everyone - it delivers success for the few and misery for the majority.

"Sheridan and his supporters offer a genuine alternative of standing up for ordinary people." Before the cort case I would problely belive this but these days I can't help thinking that may be Tommy Sheridan wants to be an autocratic leader. I can't help but wonder this as he's sacced his party and built a new one over night.

He use to come across really well but these days I'm very suspisius of him and his party and also the SSP. How can a pro-Independence party have unionist as member I Just can't understand it surely this would hinder the independence need and wants of the Scottish people.

Donald A is spot on. What the whole fiasco amounted to was that a well-known politician once had an affair, perhaps before, perhaps after he was married and that during that affair he may or may not have visited some "swinging" party.

I think the NotW would probably have dropped it and apologised if it hadnt been for their SSP witnesses. It has blown up in their face spectacularly now when those witnesses turned out to be bitter careerists and not much else.

2Heather,you talk of standing up for the ordinary people,yes i agree but there is only one way this can be done ,we must have a referendum on independence, something which has been denied scotland.They let us vote for assembly/parliament with limited powers, but independence is never there .the unionists are scared of asking the question ,why?because we would win and denie them control over us and make a success out of it.If Scotland was costing the treasury more than it got back they would have given us independence years ago.The key to all this ,lets have the referedum then the people have a chance to vote for a real Scottish government .We can then argue the finer points of how we run the Scottish economy.We have to deal with with big business sensibly,Ireland did it and it worked.The greens ,Solidarity,SSP will only make a difference,if elected, that they demand the referendum and dont split the vote insome areas.An electoral pact should be agreed by local activists to ensure that pro independence candidates are elected in 2007.I have great respect for TSheridan hes a fighter,SSP,and the Greens ,for the fact they back independence and each party has policies i like .Mr Salmond ,well he has the best chance of pulling off the referendum and must have our support,i feel he is the best statesman to do the job.[your heart is in the right place, but until you buy a house in SCO Mr Connery stay out of it ] At the Scottish general election i will then decide who i vote for ,who i feel will do the best for my country.Well,Tommy Wallace and Alec Bruce ,DELIVER FREEDOM.

Thank you #17 . I loved the link to hear Tommy's mommy sing like a drunk at the launch of his new party. It showed that Tommy is a spineless tart- happy to go for the easy targets that cost him nothing. If he had any balls he woud have told his mammie long ago to sit down and shut up. Suffering her stoney faced as she made a pig's ear of a classic song in an effort to bolster his campaign shows he has no integrity. It makes his supporters look even more gutless as they sat and sucked it all up to support a leader too feart to upset his mammie.

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