Witness 'did not see' Tommy Sheridan admission notes

MINUTES of a Scottish Socialist Party meeting in which Tommy Sheridan allegedly confessed to visiting swingers' clubs were not produced at a later meeting, the politician's perjury trial was told today.

• Gail and Tommy Sheridan

Witness Charlotte Ahmed admitted she hadn't looked at all the documents handed to her to read at a subsequent gathering of the party.

Sheridan and his wife Gail, both 46, are accused of lying under oath during his successful defamation action against the News of the World newspaper in 2006.

The action followed the newspaper's claims that he was an adulterer who visited swingers' clubs.

Mr Sheridan won 200,000 in damages after the newspaper printed the allegations about his private life.

The disputed minutes covered an emergency meeting of the SSP's executive about the News of the World's allegations.

The SSP's top brass met three times in the aftermath of the publication of an article in the News of the World about a married MSP who frequented swingers' clubs.

Sixteen members of the party's executive have previously told the court Sheridan admitted at the meeting on November 9 2004 that he was the MSP in question, and that the allegations were true.

Miss Ahmed told the court she had not been present at that meeting.

On November 24, a bundle of documents was handed out to members of the executive who had to sign them in and out, the High Court in Glasgow was told.

Miss Ahmed, 50, a chemistry teacher from Glasgow, said she had formed the impression the documents were to be destroyed following the meeting.

She said: "I didn't see any minutes at the meeting. We were given a bundle at the beginning of the meeting.

"I looked at what was at the top, but I didn't look through it. There was nothing that I would say was a minute."

Sheridan, who is representing himself in the case, showed Miss Ahmed a document purporting to be a draft minute of the November 9 meeting.

She said she didn't recognise it.

Advocate depute Alex Prentice QC asked her what had been in the bundle.

She replied: "A bundle of documents, most of which I didn't look at."

Mr Prentice told her: "You can't say it was not there, you can say you didn't see it. So it may have been there."

The trial, before Lord Bracadale, continues.