Nadine Dorries accused of making false claims about opponent during election
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Version 0 of 1. An independent candidate who stood against the Conservative MP Nadine Dorries has lodged an election petition to the high court accusing her of smearing his “personal character and conduct”. If the claims in the petition are upheld by judges it could trigger a byelection in Dorries’ constituency of Mid Bedfordshire. The petition from Tim Ireland, seen by the Independent, claims that Dorries levelled 14 false allegations against him through Twitter and comments in the media in the runup to the election. Ireland, who runs the blog Bloggerheads, which focuses on corruption in the media and politics, claims her comments contravene section 106 of the Representation of the People Act 1983, which states that it is illegal for anyone to make a “false statement of fact” about an election candidate’s “personal character or conduct”. The petition claims that Dorries accused Ireland of stalking and harassing her for eight years, infecting her friend’s computer with malware to enable him to spy on her communications, causing her friend to go into premature labour and being behind a burglary at her former home. In the runup to last month’s election, Dorries refused to go to any hustings attended by Ireland, about whom she had complained to the police several times before. Dorries had not responded to a request for comment at the time of publication. Ireland’s solicitor told the Independent that the MP maintains that her statements were factual. The case is likely to be held in front of two judges at a specially convened election court in Dorries’ constituency. If the MP is found to be guilty of breaking electoral law, she could be barred from standing for elected office for three years, as happened to the former Labour immigration minister Phil Woolas in 2010 when he was found to have lied about his Lib Dem rival. Dorries, who was first elected in 2005, increased her majority to 23,327 in the recent general election, compared with Ireland’s 384 votes. In 2012, she was temporarily suspended from the Conservative party for taking part in the TV reality show I’m a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here without first getting permission. |