SCOTTISH Labour’s messy leadership election has claimed another scalp.

An top official in Anas Sarwar’s local branch has quit less than a day after he raised concerns about a surge in members.

According to a report the Sunday Herald, John Cork, the secretary of the Glasgow Southside Constituency Labour Party (CLP) asked party bosses to probe irregularities among members.

Cork, who is a supporter of Sarwar’s left-wing rival Richard Leonard, said some of the hundreds of new members had the same mobile number but different addresses, and several had the same business email address.

A source told the paper that Cork had raised the complaint without the authority of the CLP executive, and had been naive about the publicity it would would attract.

The issue of new members has been thorny for the bitter race.

Supporters of Leonard suggested there had been a number of new members, with common email addresses opening up the online ballot to potential abuse.

While one of Sarwar’s supporters, Edinburgh South MP Ian Murray, accused the Unite trade union of "rigging" the contest for Leonard.

A spokeperson for Sarwar said: "It’s incredibly encouraging that people across Scotland have joined the Labour Party. It is deeply disappointing if anyone in the party is now launching a smear campaign against new members.”