The outspoken new deputy chairman of the Conservatives said he supports the return of the death penalty because “nobody has ever committed a crime after being executed”.
Lee Anderson MP, who has previously prompted anger with his comments on food bank users, also suggested using Royal Navy frigates to return to France those arriving in small boats across the English Channel.
In an interview with The Spectator, asked whether he would back the death penalty, he replied: “Yes. Nobody has ever committed a crime after being executed. You know that, don’t you? 100 per cent success rate,” he added.
But Rishi Sunak rejected the calls for the return of the death penalty, insisting: “That’s not my view – that’s not the government’s view”, when asked about Mr Anderson’s comments.
Explaining why he was not supporting the return of the death penalty, the PM said the government had “tightened up sentencing laws for the most violent criminals, they spend longer in prison”.
Mr Anderson, promoted by Mr Sunak on Tuesday, argued that heinous crimes, such as the murder of Fusilier Lee Rigby in 2013 by Islamist extremists, where the perpetrators are clearly identifiable, should be punished by execution.
Michael Adebolajo was given a whole-life prison term, while fellow killer Michael Adebowale was jailed for a minimum of 45 years for running over and stabbing the British Army soldier.
“Now I’d be very careful on that one (the return of the death penalty) because you’ll get the certain groups saying, ‘You can never prove it’,” Mr Anderson said.
“Well, you can prove it if they have videoed it and are on camera, like the Lee Rigby killers. “I mean – they should have gone, same week. I don’t want to pay for these people.”
The death penalty for murder in the UK was outlawed permanently in 1969 and was abolished for all crimes in 1998.
The MP for Ashfield in Nottinghamshire, who is a former Labour councillor, was appointed to work with new party chairman Greg Hands to try to help the Tories win the next election.
His promotion surprised many because he has previously played down the need for food banks, saying people should learn how to cook.
He also told The Spectator that migrants should be returned the same day to where they came from. During a visit to Calais he met migrants referring to Britain as “El Dorado”, he said.
“They are seeing a country where the streets are paved with gold. They are going to be in a four-star hotel. And they know that Serco is buying up houses everywhere, to put them in for the next five years. Why wouldn’t you come?”
Asked for his solution, he replied: “I’d send them straight back the same day. I’d put them on a Royal Navy frigate or whatever and sail it to Calais, have a stand-off. And they’d just stop coming.”
The former miner said voters often agreed with him.
“Maybe some of my colleagues think I’m a little bit too divisive. But I’m of the mind that half the population will hate you, whatever colour you wear.”
Last May, he praised as “brilliant” a food bank scheme which forced users to take a budgeting and cooking course. “I think you’ll see first-hand there’s not this massive use for food banks in this country,” he said.
“We’ve got generation after generation who cannot cook properly, they can’t cook a meal from scratch, they cannot budget.”
Then in the summer, he criticised the England men’s football team for taking the knee in protest at racism.
Mr Anderson also raised eyebrows when he described anti-Brexit protester Steve Bray as “a parasite” and “a scrounger”.
During his Westminster election campaign, Mr Anderson made a video arguing that “nuisance tenants” should be forced to live in tents and pick potatoes, getting up at 6am each day.
On another occasion, Mr Anderson got a friend to pose as an anti-Labour swing voter, in an attempt to show his support to a journalist.
Mr Anderson clashed with BBC Radio Nottingham presenter Verity Cowley on Wednesday over the video of him setting up a fake doorstep encounter during the 2019 election.
The Tory MP for Ashfield did not deny staging the episode with a friend, but asked the presenter 10 times if she had ever told a lie.
When Ms Cowley said people can tell false truths to protect people, Mr Anderson fired back: “So you’re a liar, so you’re dishonest. We’ve established you’re dishonest and you tell lies.
He added: “Let’s talk about that video because three weeks afterwards, I was voted in as the first-ever Conservative MP [in Ashfield], beating Labour by 8,000 votes. So that’s what the people of Ashfield think and that’s all that matters to me.”
