Former socialist politician Tommy Sheridan has failed in a legal bid to secure a further £200,000 payment from the publishers of the now-defunct News of the World.

The former Scottish Socialist Party leader won a £200,000 defamation action against the newspaper in August 2006 after it published false allegations about his love life.

He instructed lawyer Gordon Dangerfield to go to the Court of Session in Edinburgh last year to argue that he was entitled to another £200,000 payment from News Group Newspapers.

Mr Dangerfield wanted judge Lord Turnbull to award the sum be paid because journalists at the publication broke the law by hacking his mobile phone.

The solicitor advocate argued that the publishers of the paper should be punished for allowing its employees to use illegal methods to acquire information about Mr Sheridan.

He said his client, who was jailed in 2011 for committing perjury during the defamation action, had also committed wrongdoing - but it was at "many levels below" the conduct of the News of the World.

But on Thursday, in a judgment issued at the Court of Session, Lord Turnbull refused to grant the extra payment to be paid to Sheridan.

Lord Turnbull, who also criticised the "utterly reprehensible" conduct of the News of the World in the judgment, wrote: "There can be few other civil cases heard in modern times which has attracted such notoriety.

"I know of no other civil case in which a litigant, who sought to vindicate his reputation through an action for defamation, emerged as a criminal convicted of perjury and at the same time secured an award of very substantial sum of money.

"To include within the award of damages in the verdict a further £200,632 would be a step which many would find difficult to comprehend not least those who suffered injury to their standing and feelings as a consequence of the pursuer's conduct towards them in court and went uncompensated."

Sheridan sued the News of the World for defamation after the paper published a story in 2004 alleging he had cheated on his wife Gail with a woman called Fiona McGuire.

A jury awarded him £200,000 after Sheridan described how the claims made by Ms McGuire detrimentally affected his reputation of being a family man.

The paper claimed that he was an adulterer who attended a swingers club. Sheridan denied ever doing these things.

However, in December 2010, Sheridan was convicted at the High Court in Glasgow of committing perjury during the defamation proceedings.

The jury found that he deliberately lied during the defamation case and that he actually visited the swingers club and had sex with nurse Katrine Trolle at the same time he was married to Gail.

Sheridan then returned to the Court of Session last year in a bid to have the News of the World's publishers pay his legal bill.

Mr Dangerfield also wanted the court to order that interest of eight per cent per year be applied on the £200,000 defamation award from year from the publication of the story in 2004 to May 2017.

The lawyer said this would mean that News Group would owe his client another £200,632.

He said that the money should be paid out because of the News Of the World's use of criminal methods.

This prompted Lord Turnbull to comment that Mr Sheridan had "something in common" with the News of the World.

During the proceedings, News Group's advocate Roddy Dunlop QC said it could "be taken as read" that Sheridan's phone was hacked.

But he argued that News Group shouldn't be liable to pay the extra sum.

Lord Turnbull agreed. He wrote: "There is no other basis upon which the court could or should engage in a punitive exercise against the defenders in relation to expenses on the motion of this pursuer.

"That would be to risk giving the impression that the court thought less of his misconduct than that of the defenders."

Lord Turnbull also criticised Bob Bird, the former Scottish editor of the News of the World in his judgment. He also criticised the newspaper.

The judge said a plan to have Ms McGuire "spirited away" to Dubai during the defamation proceedings was wrong.

He added: "I accept, as is obvious, and has been so comprehensively demonstrated by the events which have unfolded over the years since the jury trial concluded, that some of those associated with the News of the World conducted themselves, on many occasions in ways which were entirely unacceptable.

"Some even engaged in criminality.

"In preparation for the civil jury trial it seems clear that the defenders engaged in phone hacking and other unwarranted invasions of privacy."