More than £80,000 has been spent policing anti-arms protests in Brighton in the past year.

According to figures released under the Freedom of Information Act, the large-scale Smash EDO demonstration in October alone set Sussex Police back £50,000.

Including another major march in June and regular protests outside the EDO MBM factory in Moulsecoomb, Brighton, it is estimated that at least £80,000 has been spent on policing the events.

Sussex Police said the deployments were needed to ensure people could “go about their lawful business unhindered”.

But Brighton and Hove Lib Dem group leader Councillor Paul Elgood, who requested the information from police, called for an investigation into why 330 officers, including 57 from Hampshire, were needed on October 15.

The £50,000 cost on that date includes £2,111 spent on accommodation and equipment for briefing officers and extra meals for Hampshire officers.

Smash EDO members campaign each Wednesday outside the Home Farm office of EDO, which opponents say makes parts for weapons used in illegal military action.

The weekly events are policed with between one and seven officers and usually pass without major incident.

But two national protests have erupted in violent riots, leading police bosses to deploy hundreds of officers.

Police said they could not put a figure on the cost of all these demonstrations, but using the average police constable pay of £17.50 an hour, The Argus conservatively estimates that more than £80,000 has been spent in the past 12 months.

Coun Elgood said: “The scale of the police operation is shocking.

It was a gross over-reaction to the protest.

“The police tied up resources from two counties to swamp the protest, at huge costs to the taxpayer.

This confrontation was not in anyone’s interest and only acted to inflame the situation.

Chief Superintendent Paul Pearce, Brighton and Hove’s most senior officer, said: “Given the levels of violence and criminality shown at a demonstration at Home Farm Road on June 4, it was necessary to deploy the numbers of officers we did for the demonstration on October 15.

“Our invitation to meet the organisers of this protest to discuss how that demonstration could take place with minimal disruption was disregarded, therefore the numbers of officers deployed was proportionate given our previous experience.

“I would rather not take officers from neighbourhood policing ... but on occasions such as this it is necessary to do so in order to maintain the peace.”

Smash EDO was unavailable for comment.