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The party that dared to tell the truth

day11The Scottish Socialist Party has faced the biggest possible test of any political party in Scottish history; what do you do when the most charismatic individual leader of the left in generations demands that the party lies and covers up in order to protect his squalid secret life.

For people who believe in truth and honesty there was only one answer and that was to refuse to be a part of the lies and cover up that Tommy Sheridan demanded of them.

Here we document the crisis that the SSP faced with articles and relevant material. No Secrets – No Lies.

Alan McCombes: The Fight For The Truth

Alan McCombes was sent to jail for defending the right of the SSP to confidentiality

smlalanjail“Tommy believed he could turn his libel action into a pale imitation of the Moscow Trials,

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No secrets – no lies: The truth behind two turbulent years in the SSP

2004

Sun 30 Oct: The News of the World (NotW) runs a front page account, by Anvar Khan, of a visit to a sex club with an unnamed, married MSP.
Two members of the SSP Executive Committee (EC), aware that the article refers to Tommy Sheridan, ask him to apologise and resign as convenor as soon as he is named as the MSP involved. He refuses.
A further attempt is made to deal with the situation privately, with Tommy invited to attend an informal meeting on Sat 6 Nov. He refuses and an emergency EC meeting is called.

Tues 9 Nov: Tommy admits to the emergency EC meeting that he is the unnamed MSP, saying he attended the club twice,

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Boarding the SSP flight to Florence

Frances Curran, international convener of the SSP, explains why the SSP is participating in the European Social Forum – what we can get from it and what we can contribute.

The idea of everybody and anybody who is involved in the “anti corporate” globalisation movement taking some time out to discuss with each other how best to fight the agenda of corporate globalisation is a relatively new idea – only two and a half years old.

The first World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil in January 2001 began the process of inviting the protesters from the streets of Seattle and many other cities worldwide, who are demonstrating under the slogan “Another World is Possible”,

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