In a now deleted tweet, recently suspended Conservative MP for Shrewsbury, Daniel Kawczynski has caused more controversy over his views on Ukrainian refugees.
His widely panned tweet said “British Left wing parties demand Britain takes in more Ukrainian refugees. This is illiterate and immoral. When war is over Ukrainians will need to return home to rebuild their country. We should be supporting Ukrainian refugees in frontline states like Poland & Romania.”
His tweet comes amid increasing pressure on the UK Government to follow the rest of Europe and welcome more people fleeing Putin’s invasion.
EU countries have introduced an open-door policy and given all Ukrainian nationals access to housing and assistance – but Britain is requiring Ukrainians to apply for visas, with some conditions relaxed.
Widespread criticism:
MPs were united in their outrage with one Conservative colleague calling the tweet “utterly risible, illiterate, immoral and offensive bile.”
In a statement issued on Thursday evening on Kawczynski’s own Association’s website, Shrewsbury and Atcham Conservatives said it wished to “dissociate themselves from the comments made by our MP Daniel Kawczynski in a tweet posted yesterday.”
The statement was included under the headline: “Tweet by Daniel Kawczynski MP “Illiterate & Immoral”
“In doing so we understand from Daniel that his intention was absolutely not to denigrate the refugees from Ukraine but put forward a position whereby the UK provides maximum assistance to neighbouring countries.”
But they add: “Nevertheless, the limitations of Twitter messages meant that this argument could not be so succinctly put and the net result was a tweet which many, including us, found offensive.
“Daniel has offered an explanation on his tweet.”
Fellow Conservative MP Simon Hoare told Kawczynski: “You do not speak for the Tory Party. I’m not sure you speak for humanity.”
Kawczynski was recently suspended from the House of Commons for one-day following a report finding that he had undermined an initial apology for bullying staff.
He was also widely criticised as it emerged that he had spent £22,000 of public money on taxpayer-funded Polish lessons.