Christine Oddy was today given cross-party support in the wake of the announcement that the Labour Party has suspended her.

The Coventry and North Warwickshire MEP learned of her fate through a letter from Labour’s general secretary Margaret McDonagh, a move that was condemned by a Conservative opponent.

John Corrie, the Conservative MEP for Worcestershire and South Warwickshire described the decision as disgraceful.

He said:

"I took over from her in this area at the last election and I have had to work very hard to keep up the work that she had done for her constituents.

"I am absolutely horrified that anybody could be treated in this way. I just cannot understand how a party can do that to someone who has worked as hard as Christine.

"To do it in the way that it’s been done by simply sending a fax across is absolutely disgraceful."

In the letter detailing her suspension, which she first saw as a fax to her Strasbourg office, Oddy was told that she was not working hard enough for her election campaign - a suggestion that Corrie finds unbelievable.

"The Labour party obviously don’t know how hard she worked because I worked beside her in the parliament, and in her constituency she was very much admired and quite frankly it is not true to say she didn’t work."

However Oddy believes that the move has been coming for quite some time. She said:

"I returned to my office after a vote in Strasbourg and found a fax from my Coventry office.

"It does not come as a great surprise because the Labour Party really hasn’t been co-operating with me since Christmas.

"They haven’t been giving me details of various event that were happening, when there have been various ministers coming to the area we might find out about it the day before or not at all."

The suspension means that Oddy will be unable to contest the European elections to be held on 10 June, but her chances of being re-elected had already suffered a massive blow months ago.