Homeless give Tory a wake-up call

A bid to relaunch the Tories as a caring party hit trouble today in the shape of an Essex girl sleeping rough in London.

Shadow work and pensions secretary David Willetts took an all-night tour of the capital's seamier side, planning to spread the Tory word while picking up ideas for policies.

But when homeless Aileen, 19, saw the MP approaching with a dozen journalists and cameramen in tow, she refused to believe his visit was anything more than a publicity stunt.

In a stand-up row, she repeatedly asked him what he could do to help, and challenged him to try sleeping rough for two weeks.

Another homeless man thrust a pungent, half-full cup of free soup under the Tory's nose and asked: "Would you eat that?".

Mr Willetts recoiled and turned down the offer, replying: "Only if I was desperate."

The confrontation came after Mr Willetts, joined by aides and hostel workers, approached 10 rough sleepers bedding down outside Westminster Cathedral.

He told Aileen: "We are trying to work out how we can make life better. Things need not be like this."

Later the girl, who did not want to give her surname, said: "I think they're speaking a load of crap. They come down here saying 'vote for me' but they are doing nothing."

She said she left her family home in Essex because of domestic violence, and had been sleeping rough for two months.

At one time she had been found a bed in a nunnery but left because she was forced to say prayers and go to bed at 8.30pm. Other hostels had turned her away.

Aileen said: "I have been offered money for sex. People come up and say 'Here's a tenner,' because when they see a young girl on the streets they think it automatically makes me a prostitute."

Among those sharing her makeshift home was Tommy Connors, who said he was dying of Aids and had left his flat to sleep on the streets because he needed the company.

Mr Willetts, a former Paymaster General nicknamed "Two Brains" for his grasp of policy, is a leading member of the Conservatives' socially liberal wing. He backed Michael Portillo for the leadership last year, but still secured a place in Iain Duncan Smith's top team.

His night-time adventure, billed a "One Nation Hearing", was part of a drive to put the Tories in touch with the disadvantaged. He dressed down for the occasion in blue cords and a blue fleece over a jumper and striped shirt.

On a panda car ride through King's Cross, police pointed out prostitutes and "shooting galleries" where addicts regularly take heroin and crack cocaine.

He visited a 24-hour sanctuary for black people with mental health problems, and chatted at 3am with checkout workers at Tesco's all-night Kensington store.

At Hackney Community College he joined a night class for asylum seekers and told them: "It's great to see people come to our country and try to master English."

It was a far cry from a year ago, when the Tories under William Hague accused Labour of being soft on asylum. Richard Payne, a teacher at the college, attacked both main parties, saying: "We've seen the scapegoating of refugees since the mid-1980s, and that climate is continuing today."

As the sun rose, Mr Willetts embarked on a round of media interviews to declare the night a success.

He said: "If you are trying to develop effective policies the first thing you do is get some experience of life in the raw.

"We are trying to show that Conservatives understand that there is such a thing as society, and that society has got its problems."