Managers at a hotel near Brighton have defended a plan to take in asylum seekers, accusing their critics of whipping up racism and hysteria.

A storm of protest broke out after we reported on Saturday that the Grand Ocean Hotel in Saltdean would be used as emergency accommodation for immigration arrivals, despite Government assurances to the contrary.

One Saltdean community web site was swamped with furious emails from residents at the weekend.

Some councillors also expressed their anger, saying there would be "hell to pay" if the hotel was filled with asylum seekers.

However, many residents have been dismayed by the response, especially the managers of the hotel who said the matter had been blown out of proportion.

Marco Pasquale, chief executive of the Grand Hotel Group Ltd, said the hotel would not be swamped with large groups of asylum seekers.

It would cater for small numbers with professional qualifications who had been found jobs under a deal struck by Home Secretary David Blunkett, who has granted four-year work permits to many asylum seekers."

Mr Pasquale said the Grand Ocean would continue to offer hotel accommodation and had already booked out 80 per cent of its rooms for the current year.

He said the hotel would not be turned into a residential home for asylum seekers. That would need permission from Brighton and Hove City Council, and the management had no intention of applying.

Another member of staff at the hotel said: "We have a huge duty to our customers who have been coming here year after year. There is no way we would jeopardise that.

"It is not like it will be illegal immigrants being kept in a hostel. These people will be here legally."

The Gatwick and Crawley Holiday Inns are already taking part in a similar scheme, each housing 40 refugees, mainly men who have fled Iraq and Afghanistan.

Those at the hotels are free to come and go as they please but are minded by a team of Home Office chaperones.

Many Saltdean residents have reacted angrily to the plan, fearing the hotel would turn the town into a small-scale version of now defunct Sangatte Red Cross refugee camp in France.

One of many letters published on the web site www.saltdean.info says: "All Saltdean residents should be very concerned about the Government's decision to allow asylum seekers to use the Ocean Hotel. It has been shown time and time again in different areas the crime rate rockets and the house prices fall."

Another letter said: "Very few of the so-called asylum seekers coming into the country at the moment appear to be genuine. Why are there so many unattached young men? At best they are economic migrants and at worst terrorists."

Others, however, say these comments are ill-informed. Another letter on the Saltdean Info site said: "Having lived in Saltdean for the last decade I am shocked at the reaction that our usually community-minded town has had to the asylum seekers staying at the Ocean Hotel."

Resident Marina Baker said: "People are ignorant to what asylum seekers are and they are willing to treat them in the way they were treated in their own countries, which was the reason they left them.

"We have muslims living in Saltdean and black people. Are we going to target them as well? What concerns me is that some people are whipping up feelings which are scaring people and old ladies."

Both the hotel management and residents were horrified by racist graffiti daubed on a wall near the hotel during the weekend. It has now been painted over.

The Green Party has urged local people and councillors to welcome asylum seekers.

Spokesman Simon Williams said: "It's time for some compassion and a chance to show that the people of Brighton and Hove are hospitable and welcoming to those in need."

Rottingdean and Saltdean councillor David Smith said in a letter to colleagues: "I am amazed and disgusted with the Labour Government's U-turn on asylum seekers being accommodated at the Grand Ocean Hotel.

"Doesn't this prove that we, the general public, cannot trust them from one month to the next?

"This volte-face will have far-reaching consequences on social services, health services and education in the city, particularly in the small community of Saltdean.

"Will the city council be able to cope with this additional burden or will all services suffer as a consequence?"