A Green councillor has refuted claims that a "protest" he organised to coincide with a charity event on the Bingley Relief Road sparked off fears that resulted in its cancellation.

Road builders Amec announced that the fun weekend, which was expected to have raised more than £30,000 for local charities on September 6 and 7, had been scrapped amid security fears about anti-road protestors.

According to Shipley MP Chris Leslie and organisers of the charity weekend, a demo had been planned by Green campaigners during the event.

But Councillor Martin Love (Shipley West) claims he had organised a family bicycle ride along the old road to call for cycle lanes to be installed.

Families were meeting at 2pm at Cottingley to ride to Crossflatts, where they would sign a petition asking Bradford Council to put in cycle lanes.

"In no way was this going to affect the charity event, we chose that date because we thought there would be more people around," Coun Love said. "We were expecting about 50 people on bikes for a 45-minute ride.

"I offered through Chris Leslie to put the organisers at ease, but never heard anything more.

"It's difficult to see how the relief road could possibly be ready for any public event, it is like a building site.

"If a protest had been planned by other organisations, I would have heard about it. Amec should come clean and tell us what their sources of information are."

Mr Leslie said that he had discussed a "peaceful anti-road demo" with Coun Love earlier this month which would coincide with the charity event.

"If he wants to demonstrate,there is nothing wrong with that but at the time, there was some concern from the organisers that there would be trouble," he said.

"I asked him to make sure it was a friendly event and he agreed. I then wrote to Amec saying it should not put them off. Now they have pulled the whole event, saying they have separate information about what's coming.

"It could be that some kind of national anti-road organisation would come in on the back of the local protest. In that case, those organising the original protest should think long and hard about the consequences for these charities.

"It is a great pity and my own feeling would be to try to continue it."

He hoped to persuade Amec to change its view, but did not hold out much hope.

Organiser Gordon Hodgson, of Bingley and Airedale Rotary Club, is convinced that the green protest started the worries.

"If they hadn't started it up in the first place, we might have talked Amec out of pulling the plug," he said.

"There was so much interest in the town about this, I am so angry about it."

An Amec spokesman has stressed the company's disappointment, but refused to elaborate on intelligence they had received.

He added: "We based our decision on reliable information, totally unrelated to the Green Party, that there was a possibility of a protest.

"Having received information that there was a risk, it would be irresponsible for us to hold an event that might be soured by some sort of disruption.

"We want to highlight in the strongest terms that the decision not to go ahead with the event has nothing to do with the progress of construction of the relief road. It is on schedule and will be opened in the autumn."

A Bradford Council spokesman said they would be looking at improving routes for cyclists along the existing A650, once the new bypass was opened.