A Conservative parliamentary candidate has defended a controversial fringe view that people with learning disabilities should be paid less than the minimum wage because “they don’t understand money”.

Sally-Ann Hart was heckled as she made the remarks at a Hastings and Rye constituency hustings on Thursday evening, where she is vying to defend the Tories’ wafer-thin majority after Amber Rudd stood down.

A furore ensued after Hart, a councillor in East Sussex, was challenged over an article she had shared on Facebook that said “people with learning difficulties should be allowed to work for less than the minimum wage”.

“It was about people with learning difficulties,” she told the crowd. “About them being given the opportunity to work because it’s to do with the happiness they have about working … Some people with learning difficulties they don’t understand about money.

“It is about having a therapeutic exemption and the article was in support of employing people with learning difficulties, that’s what it was. You should read the article.”

This is our official video of Sally-Ann Hart for Hastings and Rye speaking about people with disabilities at our Hustings last night. pic.twitter.com/LHlgWRYUyp — Hastings Independent Press (@HastingsInPress) December 6, 2019

One attendee tweeted: “I attended the hustings meeting last night and was shocked by Sally-Ann Hart’s reactionary and callous views that are more suited to the Victorian era than the 21st century.”

Labour also condemned her remarks and claimed the Conservatives had created a “hostile environment” for disabled people that would continue to push people into poverty unless the party was voted out.

“Disabled people are already shut out of employment and have been disproportionately harmed by the Conservative and Lib Dems’ cuts,” said Marsha de Cordova, the shadow minister for disabled people.

“Now, these comments further expose the contempt the Conservatives feel for disabled people, which underlie their policies towards us.”

She added: “These aren’t comments Sally-Ann Hart made years ago. She made them during this election. Anyone with such hateful views has no place in parliament.”

Hart was due to be interviewed by the BBC on Friday morning but pulled out at short notice saying she did not feel well.

She told the Guardian in a statement: “For the avoidance of doubt, I was trying to emphasise that more needs to be done to help those with learning disabilities into the workplace and having properly paid work.

“My comments have been taken out of context, but I do apologise if any offence or alarm has been caused. The number of disabled people in work has hit a record high under this government, and I am committed to doing more to supporting those with learning disabilities into good, secure jobs.”

It is believed that the article in question appeared in the Spectator in 2017. The businesswoman Rosa Monckton, whose youngest daughter has Down’s syndrome, had argued that people with disabilities would be denied the “human dignity that comes with work” unless there was a change in the law due to the “ratcheting up” of the minimum wage.

Ciara Lawrence, who works as a campaigns support officer at the charity Mencap and has a learning disability, said: “People with a learning disability, like me, can work and can make really fantastic employees with the right support.

“We have a right to be treated and paid equally – it’s the law. I’m proof that with the right support people with a learning disability can make some of the best and most committed employees.”