A Labour MP is set to urge the government to think again on plans to convert a hotel in his constituency into an asylum reception centre.

Derek Wyatt will lead an adjournment debate on the Home Office's proposals for the Coniston Hotel in his Sittingbourne and Sheppey constituency.

Ministers have already suspended the conversion plans while they undertake more local consultation, although Wyatt has said that only a judicial review is now likely to halt the scheme altogether.

The hotel forms part of government plans to build a new network of induction centres near the key ports through which most asylum seekers enter Britain.

Wyatt accused the immigration department of the Home Office of being "out to lunch" on asylum when the policy was "rushed in" in January.

"No one is running the immigration department...the minister [Beverley Hughes] has not got a handle on it," he said at the time.

After a local campaign sprang up to oppose the plans, the prime minister conceded that there had been "inadequate and wrong use of the consultation procedures".

"I entirely understand the concern of my honourable friend [Wyatt] and his constituents," Tony Blair said in the Commons.

Further consultation procedures are now underway, with Hughes having met with residents last month.

She denied accusations that the government had been "economical with the truth" over the planned 111 bed centre, instead choosing to blame the national asylum support service for failing to consult the local authority properly.

"I am very unhappy that, having wanted to proceed with the contract in December, NASS did not go back to the local authority and local community and have a proper consultation," she said.

After that meeting Wyatt said that despite the consultation exercises the decision was unlikely to be reversed by officials.

"The only way I think we will get the Coniston Hotel back now is if we can get a judicial review," he said.

Wyatt has avoiding associating himself with comments that could be thought to be whipping up racism in the town.

The British National Party has sought to exploit the issue by leafleting in the area.

But the MP insists opposition is based around residents' need for the hotel's services themselves, not racism

"We have one hotel in a town of 40,000 people and we need it. Everyone has come forward and signed our petition. The Coniston is used as a community centre, with a ballroom, a bar and eating place - we all use it," he has said.