FEARS that profit-seeking landlords may house asylum seekers in East Lancashire's slum properties without telling local authorities have prompted council chiefs to lobby the Government over its policy on refugees.

The Home Office has struck an 80-refugee deal with a private company and has already moved some 40 asylum seekers into Pendle -- without telling Pendle Council.

The council only found out about the asylum seekers' arrival when a young man from Chad in Central Africa arrived at Morrisons in Nelson with a food voucher and tried to explain his needs in a tribal language.

Council chief executives from Blackburn with Darwen, Rossendale, Hyndburn and Burnley have united with Pendle Council to lobby Home Secretary and Blackburn MP Jack Straw to ensure that that refugees are not moved into their areas without their knowledge.

Pendle Council believes that around 40 asylum seekers from Africa, the Far East and the Middle East are in its area as part of an 80-refugee deal with a private company called Clearsprings Management Ltd. Some 88 asylum seekers are due to arrive in Burnley soon under a deal with the Essex-based company. The council said it had tried to contact Clearsprings but without success, and when the Lancashire Evening Telegraph called, no one there was available for comment.

Burnley and Nelson are among four towns in Britain who, along with major cities, have been chosen to take refugees through deals between the Home Office and private firms.

Pendle director of services John Kirk said: "The Home Office has chosen to ignore the council. Why has the Government struck deals with private companies when it could use local councils to house these people?

"Councils are ideally placed to offer these services and unlike private landlords, we are not motivated by the need to make money.

"These people are arriving in a distressed state and we have a whole range of services we could offer to help them, but we have not even been told what is happening.

"East Lancashire has a lot of cheap housing which has been earmarked for regeneration, but if private landlords buy up properties to make a quick profit out of housing asylum seekers, it is hard to see how that regeneration will take place."

Hyndburn housing business chairman Coun Russ Davies slammed the Home Office's tactics. He said: "Councils have no control over these asylum seekers because the Government has taken this out of their hands. We are worried that they could be dispersed through Hyndburn without the council knowing."

Pendle Labour MP Gordon Prentice, who has spoken to Mr Straw about the issue, said: "There seems to be a lack of co-ordination with local authorities."

A spokeswoman for East Lancashire Health Authority refuted a national newspaper's claim that it had not been told about the 88 refugees who arrived in Pendle.

No one from the Home Office was available for comment.