Huhne in court over points claims (From Thisisdorset)

Huhne in court over points claims

4:10am Friday 1st June 2012 in National News © Press Association 2013

Former energy secretary Chris Huhne and his ex-wife are due to appear in court charged with perverting the course of justice.

Huhne allegedly persuaded his former partner Vicky Pryce to take his penalty points for a speeding offence almost a decade ago.

The 57-year-old, who remains the Lib Dem MP for his home town of Eastleigh in Hampshire, stood down from the Cabinet to fight the claims he wrongly told investigators his wife was driving his car.

Huhne, from Dutton Lane, Eastleigh, and Pryce, from Crescent Grove, Clapham, south London, are due to appear at Southwark Crown Court for a plea and case management hearing.

The events which led to the charges date back to March 2003, when Huhne's car was allegedly caught by a speed camera on the motorway between Stansted Airport in Essex and London.

But accusations of impropriety only emerged in 2010, after the father-of-five admitted an affair with PR adviser Carina Trimingham and ended his 26-year marriage.

Perverting the course of justice carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.