 | 'Well as they undoubtedly mean, McMaster's friends are doing him a disservice. Actually he was gay - and we will never draw the lessons from his tragic death until that is accepted.' Simon Edge in the New Statesman, August 1997. |  |
| 'Well as they undoubtedly mean, McMaster's friends are doing him a disservice. Actually he was gay - and we will never draw the lessons from his tragic death until that is accepted.' Simon Edge in the New Statesman, August 1997. | |
A report in the New Statesman magazine says that, despite denials by the MP's friends, Mr McMaster was gay.
A homosexual journalist, Simon Edge, says that the MP was seen in a gay bar in London but, when challenged, pretended he was someone else.
Mr Edge, who claims that Mr McMaster, the MP for Paisley South, was also seen in a gay bar in Blackpool during a Labour conference, makes his claims as part of an article arguing that, by denying he was gay, the MP's friends were not facing reality.
He writes: "Well as they undoubtedly mean, McMaster's friends are doing him a disservice. Actually he was gay - and we will never draw the lessons from his tragic death until that is accepted."
Mr Edge argues that the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, should sort out the "bigots" in his parliamentary party.
He accepts that it would have been difficult for Mr McMaster to be open about his sexuality due to the traditional attitudes of the area he represented. But he added that, now that there are three openly gay Labour MPs, nobody need be driven to a life of closeted depression.
Mr McMaster committed suicide last week after claims that he was driven to the edge by a smear campaign saying he was gay and had AIDS.
Last night, a government source came close to confirming the claim that Mr McMaster was gay - something which has been denied by his fellow Paisley MP, Irene Adams.
One member of the Government said Mr McMaster had "clinical depression" and personal problems which the source declined to specify but clearly referred to his sexuality. Another member of the Government said Mr McMaster had had difficulty in "coming to terms with himself", a veiled reference to his sexuality.
Labour's chief whip, Nick Brown, is investigating claims that a former Labour MP now in the Lords, Don Dixon, and the MP for West Renfrewshire, Tommy Graham, had spread rumours about Mr McMaster's sexuality .
Allegations against both men are reported to have been in Mr McMaster's suicide note which he left after he killed himself at the end of last month.
Meanwhile, a senior member of the Scottish National Party has agreed to provide key evidence to Labour's inquiry into the suicide of Mr McMaster which will prove how the MP first spoke of a smear campaign against him eight years ago.
Speaking publicly on the issue for the first time last night, Councillor Jim Mitchell, the Scottish National Party deputy leader on Renfrewshire Council, told The Scotsman how the MP had asked him in 1989 about a malicious whispering campaign about his sexuality.
Mr Mitchell, who was then the SNP leader on Renfrew District Council, said he recalled the 1989 conversation vividly when he read about smears against the MP after his death.
"Gordon was then the council leader. He brought me into his council room and he asked me if I had heard any rumours circulating about him. I asked him what he meant and he spoke about his sexuality and people suggesting that because he had not been seen with the female sex that his sexuality was being questioned.
"I told him I had not heard a word before then. He was very shocked and upset and he was raging with anger. He was very sensitive to criticism. It was obvious that certain parties, I would guess in the Labour Party, were spreading rumours even then, before he became an MP. It may have been an attempt to bring him down as council leader. He did not detail who the parties were."
Mr Mitchell added: "I told him politics was politics but you don't resort to those tactics. I liked Gordon. He gave as good as he got in politics but he was someone you could also share a joke and a laugh with.
"I think these people who are circulating these things should be drummed right out of politics and never be allowed to stand again for their party."
As The Scotsman revealed earlier this week, the inquiry will also examine allegations that two Scottish MPs close to Mr McMaster, Mrs Adams and Norman Godman, were also the victims of smear campaigns as part of a plot to supplant all three MPs.
In his suicide note, Mr McMaster criticised Mr Graham and Lord Dixon but did not explicitly link them to the gay and AIDS smears.
Both have firmly denied any involvement.
Mr Mitchell also called last night for the Renfrewshire provost, Nancy Allison, to name a councillor she claimed had sent poison pen letters to Mr McMaster before he died.
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