A secure centre for asylum seekers - similar to the one recently ravaged by fire in Bedford - could open in Essex.

Three sites near Stansted Airport are being looked at by the Home Office.

The secure centre, which would be like the one badly damaged in Bedford recently, could accommodate up to 750 people.

It would hold asylum seekers who have been rejected and those detained because they could run away.

The Home Office does not need planning permission to create an asylum seekers' removals centre.

Instead it goes through a procedure which merely allows the local authority to comment on the plans.

If there are strong objections, the Secretary of State may call for a public inquiry.

The three sites being considered are all in Uttlesford:

The old Stansted Airport terminal

Smiths Farm in Dunmow's Chelmsford Road, owned by Mantle Estates and earmarked for a business park and the preferred site for Dunmow's new police station

Thremhall Priory, Takeley, a listed building with old walled gardens and a lake which borders the airport site and has planning permission for office development.

The area's MP Sir Alan Haselhurst said: "There was no prior consultation."

He added: "I don't welcome the idea. We have seen on our televisions what has happened in Bedford. We would need assurances that similar things would not happen in our area. "

Mark Davison, a Stansted Airport spokesman, said it knew nothing of the proposals.

A Home Office spokeswoman said no details were available yet.

Published Thursday, February 21, 2002