Dudley MP, Sonia Kumar hit back at savage criticism from borough Conservatives who accused her of misleading Parliament.
A bitter row broke out after council leader Patrick Harley and Tory campaigner Bill Etheridge slammed a comment in the House of Commons from health minister Stephen Kinnock, congratulating Ms Kumar on ‘saving’ the Ladies Walk centre in Sedgley which he claimed Conservatives were ‘trying to shut’.
Campaigners became concerned about the future of the centre during negotiations for a new lease on the building which houses health and library facilities.
Ms Kumar believes Conservative councillors should have started lease negotiations much sooner, she said: “Had the council begun renegotiations when the lease permitted in 2020, the situation would never have escalated to the point where NHS services and the library were put at serious risk of closure.
“Instead, the delay created unnecessary chaos in the final months of the contract, caused deep anxiety for residents, and forced emergency interventions from residents and myself.”
The Labour MP’s stance sparked a furious reaction, Cllr Patrick Harley, Dudley Council’s leader, said the minister was wrong to say what he did and Ms Kumar was making ‘amateurish’ attempts to take credit. Cllr Harley added: “At no point was my administration remotely interested in closing Ladies Walk.
“The MP should withdraw those remarks as there was never any notion of closing the building and for her to share those words do her no credit at all.”
The Conservative candidate for Sedgley in next year’s council elections, Bill Etheridge, also went on the attack. He said: “There is no evidence Dudley Council wanted to close Ladies Walk, Parliament has been misled, this is extremely serious.”
Ms Kumar added: “The eleventh-hour crisis we faced did not appear out of nowhere.
“It was the direct consequence of failures by the previous Conservative-led Dudley Council to renew or renegotiate the building’s lease when the contract explicitly allowed them to do so, five years before the lease ended, according to lease contract documents obtained by my office via FOI request.
“That failure is set out in the lease documentation itself and was confirmed in responses I received from the council and local NHS providers.”
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