Matteo Salvini has criticised the Vatican after Pope Francis’s official alms-giver, a Polish cardinal known for his acts of charity, restored power to a building occupied by hundreds of homeless people in Rome.

Cardinal Konrad Krajewski at the weekend climbed down a manhole and turned on a switch that restored electricity to the building, saying he could no longer stand by while people suffered.

He was hailed by one newspaper, the Left-leaning La Repubblica, as “the Pope’s Robin Hood”.

The 450 occupants of the building had been without electricity and hot water for a week.

Services were cut off because the property, which has been lived in by homeless people and migrants since 2013, had run up debts of€300,000 (£260,000).