Daniel Kawczynski's own party condemns Shrewsbury MP's Ukrainian refugee comments

In a statement issued on Thursday evening on the local party's website, the local party says it wish 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."

In a since-deleted tweet, Mr Kawczynski claimed “British left-wing parties” are making “illiterate and immoral” demands for the UK to accept more people fleeing Vladimir Putin’s invasion.

The Conservative MP for Shrewsbury and Atcham argued that Britain should support Ukraine’s neighbours because “Ukrainians will need to return home to rebuild their country” when the war is over.

But Simon Hoare, Tory chairman of the Commons Northern Ireland Committee, told Mr Kawczynski he does “not speak for the Tory Party”.

In a 5.50am tweet, Mr Hoare said: “What utterly risible, illiterate, immoral and offensive bile. Haven’t you heard what @BorisJohnson has been saying?

“You do not speak for the Tory Party. I’m not sure you speak for humanity #whitehotfury.”

In a statement to the Shropshire Star, Mr Kawczynski said he had described the situation as immoral because of his belief that it "plays right into the hands" of Russian leader, Vladimir Putin.

He said the UK should be supporting Ukrainian refugees in Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Moldova.

"Labour, SNP and Liberals all attacking PM at Prime Minister's Questions over the Ukrainian refugee issue," he said

"I feel it is grossly unfair. No European country has done more to support and train Ukrainian armed forces and to provide humanitarian assistance to Ukraine.

"I felt that these politicians are deliberately pandering to the populist agenda/narrative which is Britain is impeding Ukrainians from seeking sanctuary on our shores.

"Putin is deliberately attempting to frighten professional educated Ukrainians away so that it weakens them as a nation. The greatest resources any country has are its people. Putin wants to drive them away so that his efforts to Russify large parts of Ukraine lead to its control by Russia either directly or as a puppet state.

But the Tory members added: "We are proud as an association to have supported a huge effort being made to help the people of Ukraine through our member Boguslaw (Bob) Malinowski and will continue to do so in whatever ways we can.

"His work with the Polish Integration Support Centre (PISC) in Wrexham has, with the help of around 300 volunteers, seen thousands of donations being sorted, packed in cardboard, shrink wrapped and put on pallets. Bob estimates there are enough donations to load up around 80 + lorries."