AN MP today branded the system which deals with asylum seekers a mess after it was claimed scores of people are being left stranded in East Lancashire.

The situation was highlighted by the case of mother and daughter Gabriela and Simona Cervenakova from the Czech Republic , who face being stuck in Darwen after having their application for asylum turned down -- because the government will not pay for them to get home.

The pair are due to catch their flight, organised by the Home Office, from Stanstead Airport tomorrow afternoon.

But because the Government has refused to pay the £25 each bus fare to the airport, the penniless pair face being stranded.

Solicitors acting on behalf of them said they would probably end up working illegally for hardly any money -- and scores of other asylum seekers in East Lancashire could be forced to do the same.

They said a similar situation arose last month when they paid the bus fare themselves to help a Czech woman return home.

Rossendale and Darwen MP Janet Anderson got involved in that case and said she has written to Home Office minister Lord Rooker "to get some sense" from his department. But today she branded the whole system a mess.

The Home Office has written to the family saying it would not pay for their bus fare. But today a Home Office spokesman insisted that there was provision for them to be given the fares and promised to make inquiries to establish what had gone wrong.

Mrs Anderson said: "We have people who have been refused asylum and want to go home, but haven't got the money to do so. This results in them staying, creating further problems. I have been trying to get sensible answers from Lord Rooker but failed.

"The Home Office has said there's a procedure in place but I have seen no evidence of it."

Gabriela, 55, and Simona, 17, fled their native Ostrava, close to the Polish border, in June this year, claiming to have been persecuted as Roma gypsies by skinheads. Soon after arriving in England they were bussed to Darwen where they have been staying in a terrace house, rented by the government.

The Home Office turned down their appeals for asylum on the grounds that the pair "had not established a well-founded fear of persecution."

Speaking through an interpreter Gabriela, who has been living off state vouchers, said she had resigned herself to go back home and would not appeal.

She said: "I want to go home now but I do not have any money to get back. The vouchers are going to stop next week and I do not want to steal in the street."

Darwen Law Chambers, in Railway Road, Darwen, deals with hundreds of cases on behalf of asylum seekers, including Gabriela and Simona and are appealing for people to help the family. Solicitor Russell Stanley said it was a familiar position which sends those who fail to get asylum into East Lancashire society.

He said: "We have had hundreds of clients 'disappear' into the community. There's nothing to stop them going anywhere and once the vouchers stop they end up in part-time jobs washing up for a couple of pounds an hour. The system is in chaos."

Partner of the solicitors Stephen Rees has campaigned for the government to pay the fare and allow Gabriela and Simona to go home.

The Rev Sally Thomas, who runs BRAAS -- Burnley Refuges And Asylum Seekers Support -- and its Pendle counterpart Building Bridges, said: "This is absolutely appalling. These people will get no rights whatsoever and have no real quality of life and no justice.

"This is utterly wrong. It's not just this government, the system has not been run properly for years."

A spokesman for the Home Office said today: "Provision is made for people in this position and we will be contacting this family to help them."