A BRADFORD MP has attacked cheap gun licences, which cost taxpayers a staggering £300,000 a year in West Yorkshire.

The force received just £85,240 in fees for firearms and shotguns last year, but ran up a £389,200 bill in processing the applications, new figures suggest.

Meanwhile, a plan to introduce “full cost recovery” – after pleas by police chiefs – has been abandoned, apparently on David Cameron’s orders.

A leaked email revealed that Downing Street has refused to sign off proposals to raise the gun licence fee from £50 to £88, as a first step to wiping out the subsidies.

The decision surprised civil servants and the police and provoked a Coalition row, when a Liberal Democrat Home Office minister attacked the climbdown.

Now Gerry Sutcliffe, Labour MP for Bradford South, has argued a licence fee hike is long overdue. The cost - £50 - has been frozen since 2001.

Mr Sutcliffe said: “As a former sports minister, I’m not against gun licences, but there must be full recovery of the costs of applications.

“Whatever it costs to process the licence, that should be the charge for it. Hard-pressed police forces cannot be expected to subsidise the licences.”

But West Yorkshire police declined to comment on the controversy, saying it was a matter for the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo).

Acpo is understood to have written to Home Secretary Theresa May to protest at the sudden shelving of the plans and the continuing cost to the police service.

The police have called for a rise in the fee for many years, pointing out it can cost up to £200 to process each licence.

In West Yorkshire, in the year to March 2014, there were 740 applications for guns (cost £50) and a further 1,206 renewals (cost £40). Licences are to be renewed every five years.

Labour calculated that, given the £200 average cost of processing, the West Yorkshire force was hit by a shortfall of £303,960.

In the leaked email, Home Office civil servants told various people involved in the negotiations on fees that they have been ordered to stop work on the issue.

They said: “The government recognises the huge amount of work that has gone into agreeing proposals on what the fees might look like, but does not feel it would be appropriate to pursue it further at this stage.”

Number 10 declined to comment on claims that Mr Cameron - who has hunted stags on his stepfather-in-law's 20,000-acre shooting estate - had intervened personally.

Labour said it was writing to Jeremy Heywood, the cabinet secretary, asking him to investigate whether the Cameron family's financial interests amount to a conflict of interest.