I WAS bemused by your report (LET, April 6) on a Blackburn with Darwen Council meeting where Coun John Williams was accused of inciting racial hatred when he suggested that 80 per cent of asylum seekers were bogus.

In my opinion, he was only expressing the fears of taxpayers having to bear the high cost of keeping this segment of asylum seekers for years.

Even by Mr Jack Straw's new fast track procedure, it will take three years for the immigration office to deal with each case if the individual concerned uses all the procedures available.

I feel this latest bout of political correctness by Coun Malcolm Doherty is of dubious taste. I do not expect him to exercise the forensic skills of a QC, but I do think rational debate with common sense would be most helpful.

JOHN EDDLESTON, Brownhill Road, Blackburn.