 | 'Gordon was not my enemy. I know my enemies and he wasn't one of them. I had a fabulous relationship with him.' Tommy Graham, Labour MP for Renfrewshire West. |  |
| 'Gordon was not my enemy. I know my enemies and he wasn't one of them. I had a fabulous relationship with him.' Tommy Graham, Labour MP for Renfrewshire West. | |
Tommy Graham, who has been suspended from the Labour Party pending the result of an inquiry into Mr McMaster's death, said he was confident that he would clear his name. The MP for Renfrewshire West revealed that he had complained to Labour Party headquarters in London about the conduct of the selection procedure in his constituency three weeks before Mr McMaster's suicide.
Mr Graham has been accused of being involved in a whispering campaign against Mr McMaster, but he was clearly implying that he had been the victim of a dirty tricks campaign.
Last night, however, Labour sources dismissed the claim, saying that the complaint had been immediately rejected by the party's Walworth Road headquarters and would have no bearing on the inquiry which began its work in Glasgow on Tuesday.
After two months in hiding, Mr Graham finally broke his silence over the suicide of Mr McMaster in an effort to counter some of the allegations made against him. He alleged that unnamed MPs had turned Mr McMaster against him. The Paisley South MP's suicide note is believed to say: "I hope Don Dixon [the former Labour whip] and Tommy Graham can live with themselves."
However, speaking to The Scotsman in a meeting arranged in a Glasgow public park, Mr Graham, who is still not living in his Renfrewshire home, said: "Gordon was not my enemy I know my enemies and he wasn't one of them. I had a fabulous relationship with him."
Tommy Graham yesterday: 'It has been eight weeks of hell ... Nobody welcomes an inquiry more than me. There are a lot of questions to be answered.'
The MP claimed he had been lying low to avoid reporters camped outside his home and to allow the devolution Yes,Yes campaign to go on unhindered.
"In the interests of the Labour party, the people of my constituency and the Scottish public, I went to ground ; that prevented me speaking out.
"It has been eight weeks of hell for me, my wife Joan and the boys, Thomas and John. It has been torture because of the huge publicity surrounding Gordon's death and the shock we all felt."
Speaking about the claims that he had been behind a campaign to smear Mr McMaster, he said: "I have never said this before, but about three weeks before Gordon's death, I approached officials at Walworth Road to discuss problems I had had during my own reselection process.
"There were individuals then whose conduct was not up to the standards the Labour Party demands."
Inferring that he had been the victim of dirty tricks, he continued: "There is nobody that welcomes an inquiry more than me. There are a lot of questions to be answered."
Last night, a Labour spokesman confirmed that Mr Graham had spoken to two officials at Labour headquarters, but that Mr Graham's complaint had been immediately dismissed.
He added curtly: "He asked for clarification on procedures surrounding his selection. This was given."
Yesterday, Mr Graham said: "My family and I feel very deeply for Gordon's family. I had a fabulous relationship with him. We first met in 1976 when he was just a boy, and we became pals. Last year, I was at a Rangers' match with him, and we had a great night out, a few drinks and a meal."
It was, he said, fellow MPs who had poisoned Mr McMaster, who was mugged near his London home shortly before his death, against him. "I think his feelings against me if there were any came late in the day. Seemingly, on the day he was mugged in London, Gordon approached another MP and said he'd heard I was spreading rumours about him. The MP assured him it wasn't true and left it at that. I knew nothing about that, or I'd have squared things with him myself," he said.
"The thing is, we didn't see much of Gordon after the mugging. There is no doubt in my mind that someone put the idea that I was spreading rumours about him in his head. I didn't know about it then or I'd have done something. I'd have said, brother, this is nonsense."
Mr Graham said he was forbidden from commenting on the details of the Labour Party investigation into allegations that he had broken party rules by signing up and paying for new members in a bid to bolster his own position. He said: "All I can say is that the meeting at party headquarters was just for preliminary guidance on the form the inquiry into the allegations against me will take.
"This is a chance for me and others to clear our names and I've every confidence that will happen. I've never had anything to hide I'm the sort of guy who speaks his mind. I was delighted to meet Tom Sawyer [the party general secretary], David Gardner and Lesley Quinn on Tuesday night and I have every faith that their inquiry will be a thorough and deep penetration of the situation in the party across Renfrewshire."
Mr Graham spoke about the pressure the scandal has exerted on him and his family. "I've been dealing with a lot of indirect approaches offering me money to tell my story and that disgusts me," he said. "I'm also paying lawyers to look into the reports about me which were carried by a number of newspapers and I guarantee you that action will be taken." He added that he took comfort from the assurance from Labour's chief whip, Nick Brown, that he was not responsible for Mr McMaster's suicide.
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