Verdict looms in historic case

Politics will get a lot more dirty and ugly if Labour MP Phil Woolas is cleared when the historic election court resumes for a verdict in Uppermill tomorrow.

That’s the view of Euro-MP Chris Davies, the only Liberal Democrat candidate ever to have beaten Mr Woolas at a General Election.

Mr Davies, writing on his blog, claims the decision could send a shockwave through British politics. And he says that it will determine whether election campaigning in Britain will get cleaner, or a lot more dirty.

He put forward his views on the eve of the ruling by two High Court judges who will decide on Lib-Dem Elwyn Watkins’s claim that his Labour rival Mr Woolas lied about him to boost his election chances in leaflets and a campaign newspaper.

Mr Woolas retained his Oldham East and Saddleworth seat in May after two recounts produced a wafer thin majority of only 103 votes. A verdict in favour of Mr Watkins’s election petition would unseat Mr Woolas — the first case of its kind for almost 100 years.

Mr Davies defeated Phil Woolas when he won the bitterly contested 1995 Littleborough and Saddleworth by-election, and says he should have complained more at the time about the tactics of the Woolas campaign.

They were described by former Liberal Democrat leader Paddy Ashdown as a character-assassination. He writes: “Maybe I should have done. But I had won the contest, and no sooner had the result been declared than I had a hundred things to do.

“If Woolas has never understood the difference between right and wrong in political campaigning, maybe it is because I didn’t do enough to make sure that he got the message. Whatever the judgement, Woolas’s leaflets were vile. I don’t object to robust political campaigning, but as an example of smearing your opponent these went beyond the pale.”

If the judges rule in Mr Watkins’s favour it could see Mr Woolas, Labour’s former immigration minister, unseated, barred from office, and a by-election called.

Chris Davies believes that if that happens, political candidates and agents everywhere will have to be very much more careful in what they say about their opponents.

But if the petition by Mr Watkins is dismissed, and the MP keeps his position, he fears that the judges will have given a green light to negative, personalised campaigning with no holds barred, adding: “Politics in Britain will get more ugly, and a lot more dirty.”