The cruelty of this Government is on show in handling of the migrant crisis - Yorkshire Post Letters

Last month it was reported that the Immigration Minister, Robert Jenrick, had callously ordered the painting over of cartoons designed to welcome child asylum seekers at a reception centre in Dover. Other cartoons at the Manston detention camp were also painted over.

These had been praised in a report by His Majesty's Inspectorate of Prisons saying: 'The family marquee was decorated in bright, cheerful colours.'

It was reported that this petty and mean-spirited act was ordered by Robert Jenrick as he considered the cartoons 'too welcoming'.

Now, the Deputy Chair of the Conservative Party, Lee Anderson, has said that those seeking asylum should 'f... off back to France' if they did not like being housed on the Bibby Stockholm barge.

He has received the backing of Alex Chalk the Justice Secretary, who said: 'his indignation is well placed'. No 10 subsequently said that the Justice Secretary was speaking for the Government in backing Anderson.

The Fire Brigades Union has already said that the barge is a 'potential deathtrap'. Dorset Council's environmental health team have now identified potentially deadly legionella bacteria in the water system on the barge.

The actions by Jenrick, Anderson, Chalk and No 10 are indications of the shameful depths to which this Government has sunk. They are cruel, dangerous and divisive and represent a further episode in the sorry saga of this shambolic government.