Curran rides to the rescue of battered Brown

LABOUR'S battle to win the Glasgow East by-election and save the premiership of Gordon Brown looked increasingly desperate last night after party chiefs were forced to parachute in a new big-hitting candidate.

Margaret Curran, a local MSP and former minister, was persuaded to step forward after the front-runner suddenly backed out on Friday night amid financial allegations.

Labour sources say local councillor George Ryan withdrew because decade-old claims about housing benefit fraud – over which he had been cleared – were about to be repeated by a tabloid newspaper. Ryan, it is understood, did not want his family to be put through a public ordeal.

Just a week after the departure of party leader Wendy Alexander, allies of Brown first tried to persuade Glasgow City Council leader Steven Purcell to put his name forward as a candidate for the July 24 by-election, but were rebuffed.

Finally, Curran was persuaded to step forward and will fight the seat for Labour if she wins the backing of local party activists tomorrow.

The by-election – in a seat which Labour held by 13,500 votes in 2005 – is seen as a critical test for Brown, following the party's dramatic losses in the English local elections and the Crewe and Nantwich by-election. Should Labour lose the Glasgow seat, the Prime Minister would face fresh calls to quit.

SNP leader and First Minister Alex Salmond claimed the Labour campaign was "in complete meltdown". He said: "This is their 'lost weekend' – they don't have a leader in Scotland, they don't have a candidate in Glasgow East and they have a Prime Minister who refuses to come to the constituency."

The by-election was forced by MP David Marshall's resignation.

Curran said: "I am putting my name forward because I'm deeply committed to the communities of the East End of Glasgow. I am hoping to be the Labour nominee in order that we have a spirited campaign in the by-election."

Her decision effectively rules her out of the race to take over as Scottish Labour leader, a position left vacant after Alexander quit. Labour sources said last night that if Curran wins the Glasgow East by-election in three weeks, she will stand down at Holyrood at the next Scottish elections in 2010.

Curran's decision to stand may also have been influenced by the fact that her Holyrood seat is to be merged with a neighbouring constituency, potentially depriving her or fellow MSP Frank McAveety of a seat.

Scotland on Sunday can also reveal that internal polling research by Labour shows that the party's majority in the seat has fallen from 13,500 in 2005 to as little as 5,500.

Campaign manager and Scotland Office minister David Cairns MP said last night: "We've seen in the past few weeks in Scotland that politics can take its toll on family life. It is for this reason that Councillor Ryan has decided to withdraw his name from our selection process."

He added: "This weekend we will be campaigning against the SNP plans to release thousands of prisoners from jail." But campaigning in Glasgow East, Salmond said: "The bizarre twists and turns in Labour's candidate selection shambles are chaos theory in action."

Conservative leader David Cameron will visit the constituency tomorrow, and will accuse Labour of having failed to combat the area's high levels of deprivation. Scottish Tory leader Annabel Goldie said yesterday: "Labour is rudderless at Westminster, leaderless at Holyrood and treating the people of Glasgow with contempt."

Explaining Purcell's decision not to stand, a Labour source said: "He is running Scotland's biggest council. He is serving the Labour party by continuing to do his job. The interests of the Labour party are served by him continuing to take Glasgow forward."