UNION ‘PRESSURED COUPLE INTO CHANGING TESTIMONY’

A COUPLE at the centre of Labour’s vote-rigging row changed their statements to a party inquiry after visits from a senior union activist’s wife and a lawyer, it was claimed yesterday.

Michael and Lorraine Kane allegedly altered their testimony to deny that they were signed up to the Labour party by Unite – effectively ending a probe into claims that the union had tried to fix the selection process for the safe Labour seat of Falkirk’s next parliamentary candidate.

An insider claimed that Mr Kane had agreed to join the Labour party during the course of a night out with his relative Stevie Deans, chairman of Unite in Scotland – only for several members of his family to be signed up by Mr Deans without their consent.

Mr Deans and prospective candidate Karie Murphy were suspended from Labour as a row erupted over suspected vote-rigging. The Kanes were then reportedly visited at their home by Mr Deans’s wife Claire and a local lawyer, Gerry Britton, acting on behalf of Unite.

A source said they were ‘definitely pressured’ into changing their statements.

Eric Joyce, the current MP for Falkirk, claimed the Kanes were told Mr Deans risked losing his job at an oil refinery if they did not withdraw their statements. He said: ‘That’s why they withdrew, and without that the Labour party felt it couldn’t finger them [Mr Deans and Miss Murphy].’