Conservative lapdog Nick Clegg has jumped on the Tory bandwagon by repeating claims that the selection process of the Labour parliamentary candidate in Falkirk was "dodgy."

The Deputy Prime Minister accused the Labour leadership of being "puppets on a string" operated by the unions and likened the Falkirk selection process to a "Monty Python parody of the Soviet Union."

He said that the Labour leadership should come clean about the process, despite the fact the accusations have been proved to be false.

Mr Clegg told LBC 97.3 radio: "The whole thing is so mysterious, that the Labour Party is run like this. How the trade union bosses then get elected, how they raise money, how they disperse money, is a complete and utter mystery to me."

Unite rubbished the claims and laughed off Mr Clegg's comments.

A Unite spokesperson said: "Mystery? What mystery? It's not a mystery to millions of working people. Labour was founded by trade unions to represent those people so of course there's a close relationship.

"This government, which Nick Clegg is part of, is not on their side. They are presiding over a rising cost of living, rising energy prices and a country being burned into part-time Britain. If there's any puppet on a string it's Nick Clegg, who is the puppet of Cameron and Osbourne."

Earlier this week Labour leader Ed Miliband rejected calls to reopen the party's inquiry into the Falkirk selection battle after constituency chairman and Unite official Stephen Deans' emails were released.

Mr Deans and candidate Karie Murphy were reinstated in September after a Labour investigation found no evidence of wrongdoing.