A ROW has broken out over accusations that the Labour party deliberately “politicised” Saturday's event to celebrate the opening of the Arcade site.

The long-vacant site, on the corner of Hoe Street and High Street, is now open to temporary use and a fun day was held to mark the occasion.

But Lib Dem deputy council leader John Macklin was fuming that Labour activists were handing out party political leaflets claiming credit for the site's opening.

Cllr Macklin said the event could be viewed as a “poorly disguised political rally for the Labour party.”

He said: “I am angry that the local Labour party thought it was appropriate to use a community fun day that had been paid for and promoted by the council as a platform for their own self-promotion.

“Labour members were using what should have been a non-political family event paid for using taxpayers' money to distribute promotional literature claiming credit for the development.“

Cllr Macklin said the Lib Dems deserve the credit for the site opening because it was Lib Dem members who amended a council motion last December, calling for the authority to examine ways the site can be used.

He said activists were handing out the leaflets on the site itself before he asked them to move in to the nearby streets.

Labour leader Chris Robbins denied the activists had been leafleting on the site itself and said Cllr Macklin had “completely overreacted”

He said the plan to open the site for temporary use was his own initiative.

He said: “Cllr Macklin is furious because this is clearly a Labour party initiative and we are letting people know it is a Labour party initiative.

“He may be upset about this but he is just going to have to live with it.

“For too long the Lib Dems have been piggy-backing on ideas that we have come up with as the Labour party.”

This is not the first time the Labour and Lib Dem groups have publicly disagreed recently.

In March Cllr Macklin and his Lib Dem colleagues voted against the plan to bail out the long-term Arcade development with £35m of taxpayers' money.

It was believed to be the first time the cabinet has split along party lines since the formation of the joint administration in 2002.

And earlier this year a controversial plan to convert the former St James St library building, in Coppermill Lane, was shelved following opposition from the Lib Dems.