AS someone who lives in, shops in, and has concerns about Radcliffe's future, I find Neil Higginson's attitude (Radcliffe Times, August 29) to the proposed community centre in Church Street to be quite deplorable.

To describe refugees and asylum-seekers as "the dregs of society" is an insult to the many people around the world who, due to conflicts we often involve ourselves in, seek our support.

The fact that we need such people to staff our under-resourced schools and hospitals is another issue, but Mr Higginson's comments are at best ignorant, naive, bigoted, and help to perpetuate myths about "outsiders" ruining our society. This is the very attitude that fuelled the Holocaust in Germany. Curiously, our press and public were equally hostile to Jewish refugees escaping Nazi persecution in the thirties as they are to refugees today, so perhaps nothing changes.

This centre will add to Radcliffe's future, not diminish it. It will provide a focal point for many much-valued and needed community groups, most of which will be made up of local people. From my experience of living in Radcliffe, you don't need "outsiders" to cause trouble; there are plenty of locals who are perfectly able to behave in an anti-social manner when they wish to.

If Mr Higginson is concerned that opening this centre will discourage his customers, then he is partly correct. I for one will avoid at all costs going into any of his five shops. I don't like giving my money to people who hold such views. Could I ask the Radcliffe Times to print a list of his businesses so that I can personally boycott them!

CHRIS KELMAN,

Rupert Street, Radcliffe.