Defence Secretary Grant Shapps has responded to outcry from a Telegraph reader after it was revealed that asylum seekers have been given jobs.
It comes after a Freedom of Information request released yesterday revealed that nearly 16,000 asylum seekers, including those who crossed the Channel in small boats, have been allowed to work in a single year.
Camilla Tominey echoed the word of a reader of the Telegraph today in an interview with Defence Secretary Grant Shapps and asked him if it "was correct."
Tominey said: "I spoke to my paper reviewer about the response from a Telegraph reader to this story, a man called Matthew McKay. He said he was 58-years-old.
Grant Shapps spoke to Camilla Tominey on GBNews
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"He's from a white working-class family. He's got three children, and his wife is a care worker.
"He said 'Can anybody tell me why I bother? What is the point of working when so many now, including illegal immigrants, seem to be respected more and certainly looked after better?
"What is the point in getting up every morning and trying to look after my country when my country has turned its back on hard-working people like me?' He's right, isn't he, Minister?"
The Tory MP for Welwyn responded: "I don't think that is a fair reflection at all. We have record low unemployment in this country and high employment levels.
"There are jobs. We're just talking about the problems in recruiting.
Camilla Tominey asked the MP if migrants should be allowed to work illegally
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"We also have developed, in terms of that illegal migration those small boats, a whole series of different bills, acts of law."
Tominey asked him: "But why is the government allowing illegal migrants to work? Is it because, as we all suspect, the Home Office is a basket case and can't keep track of half these people?"
He explained: "Well look, I don't know the specific answers." And Tominey simply asked: "you can't answer my question, should they be working?"
Shapps responded: "We have consistently tightened up the rules to make sure that it that people can't come here and then claim asylum if they are economic migrants.
"That is a key point that will be overturned by Keir Starmer and the Labour Party because they have forced us tooth and nail. They can't say what they would do and they don't have the plan to sort it out."
The MP was accused of 'not answering the question'
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Tominey asked: "Just a final time, Mr. Shapp, should people coming here illegally by boat be allowed to work, yes or no?"
Shapps said: "I think in in general, the answer is clearly no.
"I don't know the specifics of the case, which I've been very, very clear about.
"But I do think the principle that lies behind it is that the Conservatives have been very clear about not allowing people to come here illegally. And that's been fought against by Keir Starmer."
