TWO political parties have been accused of not playing by the rules in their distribution of election material across two Hampshire constituencies.

Eastleigh's Liberal Democrat candidate Chris Huhne has been accused of using his European Parliament-funded allowances to pay for leaflets in the General Election campaign.

The allegations have been made by former Itchen, Test and Avon Conservative MEP Edward Kellett-Bowman who has reported the allegations to the President of the European Parliament.

But the allegations have been strongly denied by Mr Huhne who described them as "absolutely unproven."

And in Fareham Liberal Democrat chiefs have called for an independent investigation after Tory council leader Sean Woodward used public resources to send out campaign material.

Councillor Woodward - a Hampshire County Council hopeful - has apologised after two copies of his manifesto were posted through the council mail service.

According to Mr Kellett-Bowman, European Parliament rules state that money granted to each MEP in the information budget may not be used to "finance any form of European, national, regional or local election campaign."

Mr Kellett-Bowman's complaint centres around a newsletter which he alleges was delivered by Eastleigh Liberal Democrats in the first few days of the General Election campaign.

He says that on the third page of the leaflet the article states it was sponsored by the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats of Europe.

"Mr Huhne has been keen to make the funding of opposition campaigns in this constituency an election issue.

"It now appears that he is the one who has broken clear rules and used taxpayers' money to part finance his campaign."

But Mr Huhne hit back at the allegations. He said: "Basically it is absolutely unproven that any piece of election literature on any EU subsidy went out during the campaign.

He added: "I am completely and categorically saying there has been no sponsorship of my campaign material."

Fareham Council's Lib Dem opposition leader at the council, Councillor Roger Price, said their party is "incensed" at taxpayers' money being spent on campaign material. He is writing to the Standards Board to get a full investigation underway.

He said: "The copies of the leaflet sent out were purely for political purposes and they should not have been sent using council resources."

Cllr Price also said that the leaflets were contained in executive leader's envelopes with council compliment slips.

But Cllr Woodward said the envelopes and the slips contained with the leaflets were his own and not council ones.

He said that they had been posted through the council mailing system by mistake by his "efficient" secretary.

"I left the envelopes on my desk and was going to deliver them myself. Unfortunately my very efficient secretary posted them for me before I got to them," he said.

"I have already repaid the council for the cost of the postage. The slips were my own photocopied at home and so were the envelopes."

For more on the 2005 General Election campaign - see pages 8 & 9 of today's Daily Echo.