Tommy Sheridan, the former Scottish Socialist MSP facing trial for lying under oath during his libel action against the News of the World, is to train as a lawyer.

The Solidarity leader, who sacked his legal team and represented himself in his successful libel trial, plans to start a two-year accelerated graduate entry course at the University of Strathclyde this autumn, followed by a year’s diploma in legal practice.

Sheridan is currently coming to the end of a one-year masters degree in social research at Strathclyde, and already has a politics degree from Stirling.

As leader of the Scottish Socialist party, he won £200,000 damages from the News of the World after it claimed he was an adulterer who had visited a swingers’ club in Manchester.

Early in the five-week hearing at the Court of Session, Sheridan sacked his legal team after a row over the treatment of a witness and conducted the case himself. At the time, he quipped that his wife Gail wanted him to be a lawyer.

The jury voted 7-4 in his favour, but the News of the World is appealing against the verdict.

During the trial, Lord Turnbull said the highly contradictory nature of some of the the evidence strongly suggested someone had lied in the dock. Lothian and Borders police mounted an inquiry and last year Sheridan was charged with perjury.

His wife Gail was also charged, along with her father Gus, and four witnesses who denied Sheridan had confessed to going to a swingers’ club.

To date, the crown has only brought proceedings against Sheridan and his wife, who appeared on petition at Edinburgh Sheriff Court in February.

An indictment is expected to be served next month, and a preliminary trial hearing has been scheduled for late September, when the parties will try to agree on a trial date.

After Sheridan’s victory in the defamation case his political fortunes declined. He left the Scottish Socialists to form Solidarity, and failed to be re-elected as a Glasgow MSP last May.

Earlier this year he was sacked as a presenter on the Talk 107 radio station.

Last week British Airways reinstated Gail Sheridan as a hostess after a disciplinary hearing cleared her of stealing alcohol miniatures.

Sheridan has spent several nights in jail for breaking the law in peaceful protests against the poll tax and Trident. However, a spokeswoman for the Law Society of Scotland said that would not debar someone from becoming a lawyer.

Aamer Anwar, the high profile lawyer who is a friend and political ally of the former MSP, predicted that Sheridan would become one of Scotland’s finest legal operators.

“The best quality that anyone can have when becoming a lawyer is to have empathy with their clients, and to have been through the same system, and to recognise exactly what it is to become a lawyer,” he said.

“I think Tommy Sheridan will be an excellent lawyer.”

Hugh Kerr, Sheridan’s spokesman, said the former MSP planned to enrol shortly.

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