THE former wife of an MSP has told a court he punched her in the eye two weeks before their wedding.

Bill Walker, 71, went on trial at Edinburgh Sheriff Court yesterday accused of a string of assaults against four women over a 28-year period.

The member for Dunfermline denies all the charges.

His first wife Maureen Traquair told the court she had to buy concealer for their wedding day in January 1967 after he gave her a black eye during an argument.

Mr Walker is alleged to have assaulted her on three occasions at addresses in Edinburgh.

Ms Traquair, 66, said: "It was two weeks before we married and I was hit on the eye by Bill."

She told the court about the couple's life in Chicago, where they moved after the wedding.

She said: "Bill didn't want me to work, he was quite clear his wife would not work."

Ms Traquair described an occasion after she started a job when she bought him a gold watch for Christmas.

She said: "He opened it then he stood up and left the apartment and threw it down the chute to the furnace. He said I was to hand my notice in at the first opportunity and I wasn't allowed to work."

Asked by fiscal depute Les Brown about her clothes, she said: "Bill would take me out and he would approve or disapprove. I had to try the clothes on and he would decide whether or not I could have it."

She described another occasion when the couple were living in France and she returned home late. She said: "He was furious his meal wasn't made. I was told my place was in the kitchen."

Ms Traquair, an artist, photographer and shop owner, said the couple had returned to Scotland shortly before the end of their marriage in June 1970.

She said she was slapped after confronting him about suspicions he was seeing another woman.

The court heard the couple were divorced but rekindled the relationship around 1984, and later became engaged again.

During a meeting when she decided to call the marriage off, she said he was again violent.

He said: "He tore the engagement ring off my finger."

Under cross-examination by Mr Walker's lawyer, solicitor advocate Gordon Martin, Ms Traquair denied she was telling a "pack of lies". She replied: "He knows what he did.

"I'm not lying. I'm here because the police came to me and asked me to answer questions."

Mr Walker's second wife Anne Gruber told the court he attacked her daughter Anne Louise Paterson with a saucepan in 1978, not long after telling her he wanted a divorce. She said the couple had married in 1970 but he became "disinterested" when she was pregnant with their third child.

The family were eating a meal before she moved out with the children when he criticised the trifle she made, the court heard.

Mrs Gruber, 71, said: "He took the pan from me. He then was about to turn on me with it. She saw what was happening and intervened. He turned on her and whacked her repeatedly over the head with a yellow saucepan that was so badly broken up it was put in the bin.

"He battered her so hard she was down on the floor. Her head was bleeding and she was bruised. She tried to defend herself. I think she punched him in the face."

Mrs Gruber told the court she had been punched on another occasion when in bed.

Mr Walker denies 23 charges of assault and one of breaching the peace. He is alleged to have attacked Maureen Traquair, Anne Walker, Anne Louise Paterson and Diana Walker between January 1967 and January 1995. The alleged assaults are said to have taken place at addresses in Edinburgh, Stirling, Midlothian and Alloa.

Mr Walker, of Alloa, Clackmannanshire has lodged a special defence of self-defence in relation to three of the charges. He was elected as an SNP MSP for Dunfermline but is now independent. The trial continues.