JACK Straw believes Saturday’s protests will damage the English Defence League – not community relations.

The Blackburn MP also told of anger at the estimated £1million policing bill, which Malcolm Doherty, chairman of the Lancashire Police Authority, said would be a problem for the cash-strapped force.

Mr Straw predicted EDL support would fall, adding: “My great anxiety was that the protest could spark off problems that would set back all the efforts everyone has been making for a long time.

“If there were more than 100 members of the EDL from Blackburn with Darwen in that protest, then I will eat my hat.”

Mr Straw said the EDL was guilty of ‘outrageous self-indulgence’ and it had been ‘intent on violence’, not the peaceful protest the group had promised.

Mr Straw described the massive police operation as ‘completely necessary’, but said there was anger at the EDL over the cost.

He said: “If you got change from a million pounds you’d be lucky.

“That there was so little trouble is a testament to the police who have built up relationships so carefully over the past decade.”

Mr Straw said if the protest hadn’t been in the town centre, police may have lost control.

“The original plan was to hold the protest in a park, away from the shops,” Mr Straw said.

“But the police only have the power to impose conditions, not ban them from where they want to protest.”

Police authority boss Coun Doherty said costs of the event were ‘a problem’ at a time when the force was facing massive cuts.

He said: “That means that something else doesn’t get paid for, and that’s the problem."

Salim Mulla, chairman of the Lancashire Council of Mosques, praised police and the council.

He said: “Everything went to plan and the fact there were no major incidents, and that the EDL were frogmarched in and frogmarched out, means that there will be no lasting effects on community relations.”