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Wales' newly-elected Ukip MEP says he sees no inconsistency between his party’s stance on immigration and the fact that he employed “dozens” of eastern European and Filipino workers in a care company.

It has emerged that Mr Gill, who lives in Anglesey, was a director of a number of family businesses that owned property and provided care services on contract to Hull City Council in Yorkshire.

He yesterday confirmed he had employed “dozens” of immigrants from new EU countries like Poland and others from the Philippines. He also said he had provided “bunkhouse” accommodation for employees and others who had migrated from eastern Europe.

One of Ukip’s major campaign policies at the recent election was its opposition to unlimited migration from other EU countries.

Mr Gill said: “We employed people from overseas because we could not find local workers to do the jobs. We had a care home of our own, but mostly our workers were employed on home care contracts we had with Hull City Council and other organisations. The workers were paid more than the minimum wage, but not massively more.

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“The amount we could afford to pay was determined by the amount of money we received from the council.

“Working in care is quite tough and we had a big turnover of staff. The bunkhouses were temporary accommodation we offered to people coming from overseas until they could get something more permanent. We charged £50 a week inclusive of electricity to people who would be earning between £200 and £300 a week. I wish I had that proportion of spending money left after paying my mortgage.”

Mr Gill said he did not consider there was any inconsistency between his role as a Ukip politician advocating Ukip’s policies and his previous role as someone involved in importing labour from overseas.

He said: “So far as the workers from the Philippines were concerned, it was not at all easy to get work permits. We had to demonstrate the lengths we had gone to in trying to recruit local labour. Work permits would not have been granted if we could have recruited locally.

“We didn’t need work permits for people coming in from Poland and other new EU countries because they had a right to come to the UK and work. But based on our difficulty in recruiting local people, I would imagine there would have been no difficulty getting work permits if that had been necessary.

“My focus at the time was to employ people who would enable us to fulfil as a business the care contracts we had. I can see how this could look bad, but it’s a case of ‘damned if you do and damned if you don’t’. If we hadn’t employed people from overseas, we’d have been called racist. The fact that we did employ immigrants is leading to charges of hypocrisy. But Ukip has never said it wants to stop all immigration – it wants to limit the numbers.”

Mr Gill said his family firm, Burgill Ltd, had crashed with a deficiency of £116,000 when the HSBC ended its borrowing facility in the wake of the banking crisis.

A Welsh Labour spokesman said: “That Nathan Gill cannot see the hypocrisy of his actions is totally unbelievable. This is hugely embarrassing for him given only two weeks after he was elected on an anti-immigration platform.

“Having made a living on the backs of cheap labour from eastern Europe it is utterly shameful for him to then stand on a populist platform and decry immigration in an attempt to get elected. Rather than pretend he’s done nothing wrong, Nathan Gill should publicly apologise for his behaviour.”

Read more:

Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood calls for main parties to confront 'despair' in Euro poll results after Ukip election surge

European elections: How you responded to UKIP claim that Valleys are 'ours for the taking'

Twitter users blame Russell Brand and his 'revolution' for strong UKIP showing

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