LONDON (Reuters) - British officials were holding crisis meetings on Monday over an influx of gypsies from the Czech and Slovak republics claiming political asylum, but suspected of merely seeking a richer life in England. More than 150 gypsies arrived in the southern English port of Dover over the weekend, adding to some 800 who have landed in the town by ferry from France over the past few months. French police sources said about 60 were turned back to the French Channel port of Calais on Monday and another 140 would follow suit shortly. French authorities had not yet decided what to do with them, but they might be sent home on coaches, the sources said. Some British press reports said another 3,000 were heading across Europe to England, apparently attracted by television portrayals of a good life on state welfare payments. "We have got an insoluble problem here. Dover is not a big place. It is a small town of 30,000 people with very limited facilities," Keith Ferrin, deputy leader of the town's council, told BBC radio. Most of the asylum seekers say they were fleeing from racial harassment in their own countries. According to official figures, Britain has considered 140 applications for asylum from Czech and Slovak refugees in the past year and rejected them all. But in the months it takes officials to process such claims, local authorities are obliged to house claimants, find schools for their children and pay welfare payments of 44 pounds ($71.7) a week. Ferrin said his council was already facing a bill of one million pounds. Home Office junior minister Mike O'Brien was meeting officials in Dover on Monday as was a representative from the Slovak embassy. The Slovak embassy has said the gypsies have no grounds to claim political asylum. O'Brien warned that Britain would not be seen as a soft touch on immigration. Ferrin said that accommodation for the families, many of whom include young children, was at bursting point in Dover. "Any more that arrive will have to go into an old folks' home which was closed down when the heating broke and which has not been repaired," he said.