Mullin: Fears over BNP

The British National Party is set to field a record 221 candidates in next month's local elections.

The party is hoping to build on its controversial wins last May when it took three seats in Burnley and two more in by-elections in Blackburn and Calderdale.

Next month the party believes it can take at least 12 seats in Labour heartlands.

Sunderland has become a key battleground and unsurprisingly the issue of asylum is on the campaign agenda.

"Sunderland has seen a palpable invasion of asylum-seekers who have been dumped in the poorest parts of the city. That has created resentment which is going to manifest itself at the ballot box," said a BNP spokesman.

Senior Labour backbencher Chris Mullin, the MP for Sunderland South, slammed the party's tactics claiming that the city of 289,000 had taken just 1800 asylum seekers over the last two years.

"They are circulating some very nasty newsletters which appeal to the lowest common denominator," said Mullin.

"The fabrications are frightening, they are bad for the image of Sunderland and I fear that unless people turn out and vote for the traditional parties, then sooner or later we will get a BNP councillor here."