THE leader of Thurrock's Labour group has responded to calls for his resignation from rival Tories by reiterating his claims that adult social care charges in the borough are set to go up.

Speaking in the wake of a further barrage of criticism from council leader councillor Terry Hipsey that Labour is scaremongering, councillor John Kent has issued a fierce rebuttal.

He said: "We're campaigning to stop Tory councillors from imposing draconian charges for social care services that were free when they took over in June 2004. We are not going to be deflected by ill-judged hysterical outbursts.

"It's worth remembering what we are talking about here. Huge increases in charges to services that were free until the Tories took control of the Council in June 2004.

"If the Tories have their way:

Day Care would go up from £1 to £21.20

Home Care Rate would go up from £9 per hour to £13.90.

Transport Charges would go up from £0.25 to £1.85

The Maximum Charge would go up from £75 to £345

"Our campaign has already won a reprieve, the Tories were desperate to implement them in October, this now cannot happen.

"Hopefully if enough people say they no to these huge increases the Tories will be forced to back down.

"We want - a resounding NO to make the Tories think again. Despite their protests it's very clear from what top Tories have said they have made up their minds.

"In August when the Tory Cabinet rejected our recommendation that charges should be kept as low as possible, councillor Amanda Arnold said: 'We have to consider the negative effect on the council if we have to seek funding for social care by other means. This might mean the lights going off at night or fortnightly bin collections.' "Councillor Ben Maney added: "It's very easy to say keep it low, but there has to be funding' and deputy council leader councillor Sue MacPherson said: "We need to give this the go ahead now.' "Nothing has changed. They are fully behind these massive increases which would put services beyond of the reach of the very people they were designed to help.

"That's unacceptable to us and we will continue our vigorous campaign against them."