A BITTER rift between ousted MP George Galloway and his successful Labour rival Naz Shah has deepened, after the Respect MP reported her to the Director of Public Prosecutions.

The Respect leader, who lost the Bradford West seat to Ms Shah by more than 11,000 votes on Thursday, has now claimed Ms Shah made false statements about him during the campaign trail to try to influence the outcome of the election - claims which Labour had branded "pathetic and without any foundation".

GEORGE GALLOWAY STARTS LEGAL CHALLENGE AGAINST BRADFORD WEST POLL RESULT

A spokesman for West Yorkshire Police said officers were "looking into the matter to establish if any offences have occurred".

Over the weekend, Mr Galloway had also claimed that there had been "widespread malpractice in this election, particularly over postal voting".

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But Bradford Council bosses, who ran the election, said they had so far received no such complaints from him or his team.

Suzan Hemingway, acting Returning Officer, said: "We are disappointed that, if Mr Galloway thought there was postal vote fraud, he didn't report this before the Bradford West election result. We have not received any communication from Mr Galloway or his office regarding concerns about postal vote fraud or any proposed legal challenge in relation to the Bradford West election result."

A spokesman for Mr Galloway responded by saying the alleged fraud had only come to light after the election.

He said: "We are compiling a dossier to be submitted, and obviously we will be talking to her about it."