SWIMMERS are facing "betrayal" over the community pool being proposed to replace York's Barbican Baths, a senior Labour councillor claimed today.

Coun Alan Jones said residents could end up with a smaller pool than the one which closed down earlier this year - and no children's pool.

"York people appear to be getting less and less back for the sale of the Barbican," he said, adding that support for redevelopment of the Barbican had been dependent on people seeing better - not worse - facilities once the new pool opened.

Coun Jones, Labour's leisure spokesman, spoke out in the wake of a report on the Barbican to today's meeting of City of York Council's executive.

The report, by leisure director, Charlie Croft refers to costing having been obtained for a new five-lane pool in Kent Street, adding: "A six-lane tank could be built for an additional £130,000.

"This would not, however, be an essential requirement for fitness and general swimming."

The report also says that "consideration should be given to inclusion of a toddler pool," which would provide an additional attraction for parents and families. However, the additional costs of this would need to be assessed.

Coun Jones claimed that last year, residents had been told a six-lane pool and children's pool would be built. "This is an absolute betrayal of what the Lib Dems promised," he argued.

But the Liberal Democrat executive member for leisure, Coun Keith Orrell, said Labour seemed to have a basic misunderstanding of the tendering process that was being undertaken.

"We have set aside £6 million for the new Kent Street facility. This is more than Labour had envisaged for their scheme, which was not costed nor tested, and would not have been delivered for the money they proposed," he claimed.

"We are now asking tenderers to put forward schemes to give the maximum facilities for the money available, including getting the best environmentally sustainable solution we can."

He said Labour seemed to have forgotten that money from the Barbican development was always intended to be used for desperately-needed modernisation of three pools across the city.

"The logic of what they are saying is that there should be an open cheque for the Kent Street facility with minimal financial controls, which could result in there being no money for Yearsley or Edmund Wilson."

Updated: 10:36 Tuesday, November 09, 2004