THE conviction of mass murderer Jeremy Bamber may be one of the great miscarriages of justice in recent years, Basingtoke MP Andrew Hunter has claimed.

Bamber - who lobbied Mr Hunter from prison to take up his battle to have the convictions overturned - was sent to prison for killing five members of his own family in a frenzied attack.

The bodies of his adoptive parents, Nevill and June, his sister Sheila Caffell and her six-year-old twin boys Nicholas and Daniel were found at the family home in Tolleshunt D'arcy, Essex, in 1985. They had all been shot.

Bamber was found guilty of the murders and was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1986. He has always protested his innocence, but two attempts to quash the convictions in the Court of Appeal failed.

Mr Hunter believes evidence that would prove Bamber's innocence has been overlooked, and since he has taken up the fight, the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) has decided to review the case.

But during a debate in the House of Commons on Wednesday, Mr Hunter - who has vowed to put up more than £100,000 bail money for Bamber - called for the Government to look seriously at the case.

He said evidence that had emerged in the last 12 months gave him grave concerns for the safety of the conviction.

And he called for the defence team to be given access - so far denied - to the notebooks of the inspector who headed the inquiry, audio tapes describing the scene of the crime and the original radio and telephone message logs and incident reports.

"Bamber's conviction may be another of the great miscarriages of justice of the 1980s, to be bracketed with the Birmingham Six, the Guildford Four and others," Mr Hunter said.

"It is now time for the Home Office to take matters seriously and look very closely, not only at the few points which I have made, but also at the whole Bamber affair - in particular, the issue of non-disclosure and the behaviour and attitude of Essex Constabulary.

"Such action is necessary to avoid perpetuating what a growing number of people fear may be one of the greatest miscarriages of justice of our time."

Bamber, now 44, was never an original suspect for the killings. Detectives originally worked on the assumption that Ms Caffell - a former model known as Bambi - had shot everyone in the house before killing herself.

But the focus later shifted to Bamber after police cited a sizeable inheritance as the motive.

Mr Hunter believes the pages of radio and telephone messages sent by officers to police headquarters - and only recently obtained by the defence after a court order - blatantly contradict evidence given at the trial, as does photographic evidence that was not produced at the trial.

He said it was scandalous evidence had been withheld from the defence for up to 19 years. "Even worse, it is still going on today," Mr Hunter added.

If the CCRC gives permission for a fresh appeal, then his legal team are likely to apply for him to be freed pending the hearing - with Mr Hunter's bail money as surety.

Home Office minister Fiona McTaggart told Mr Hunter it was not appropriate for the Home Secretary to interfere in the matter as the CCRC was considering it.

She also read the ruling for the Court of Appeal judges in 2002 that stated the jury had reached the verdict they were entitled to in light of the evidence they had been presented with at the court case.

A spokesman for Essex police said it would not comment on the case because it was being looked at by the CCRC.