Migrants living in taxpayer-funded asylum hotels are securing work as fast food delivery riders within hours of entering Britain, it has emerged.

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp said he had found evidence of asylum seekers breaking rules which bar them from working while their claim is processed by the Home Office.

The Tory politician visited an asylum hotel in central London and posted a video showing bicycles fitted with delivery boxes for Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats parked outside.

In a letter to Home Secretary Yvette Cooper he urged her to begin action against all three firms and ‘take urgent steps to stop illegal working from the very hotels that you are responsible for running’.

Separately, it emerged that Deliveroo and Just Eat delivery accounts were being offered to migrants ‘within 10 minutes of asking’ through social media groups.

Migrants were paying as little as £40 a week for other people’s login details as riders for the delivery companies – a loophole the firms pledged to address more than a year ago.

Shadow home secretary Chris Philp pictured visiting an asylum hotel in central London where he found evidence of migrants working as fast food delivery riders for well-known apps

Bikes with household name delivery bags were found parked outside the asylum hotel in a video posted online by Shadow home secretary Chris Philp

An undercover reporter posing as a small-boat arrival from Afghanistan was ‘quickly flooded with offers from all over the country’, the Sun reported.

In his letter to the Home Secretary, Mr Philp said: ‘Labour claim to be cracking down on illegal working, yet this is happening at the very hotels your Home Office is running, and which are being funding by taxpayer’s money.

Chris Philp discussed the asylum seekers' activities withe hotel occupants, whose identities were obscured in the Tory shadow minister's online video

‘This is important, as the ability to work illegally is a pull factor for illegal immigration and is fuelling the illegal immigration crisis.’

In separate letters to the three delivery companies he urged them to ‘commit to removing any driver as a courier who does not have the right to work in the UK, including at this hotel site and also elsewhere’.

He added: ‘I would be grateful if you would set out what further specific steps you will take (above what you currently do, which is evidently not working) in relation to this site and more generally to prevent illegal working.

The Tory frontbencher found delivery bikes parked outside the central London asylum hotel

‘I will be writing to the Home Secretary to urge her to take urgent action via Immigration Enforcement against your company.’

In April last year the firms agreed to close the loophole permitting riders to give jobs to ‘substitutes’ – meaning people with no right to work in the UK were able to get employment.

After visiting the asylum hotel the shadow home secretary said he would write to the Home Office urging action against Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats

Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats said they would introduce additional checks on ‘account sharing’ following talks with the Home Office.

The Home Office said it amounted to a ‘significant’ change which would ‘protect the British public’s safety’ from unvetted riders.

The then Conservative minister for countering illegal migration, Michael Tomlinson, said at the time: ‘Illegal working puts their customers at risk, drives down wages and defrauds the taxpayer.

‘It is vital that we shut down any loophole that allows it to happen.’

The loophole highlighted concerns about the largely unregulated ‘gig economy’.

A Deliveroo spokesman said at the time: ‘We are the first major platform to roll out direct right to work checks, a registration process and identity verification technology to ensure that only substitutes with right to work can continue riding on our platform.’

Representatives for Uber Eats and Just Eat said in April last year they were working on implementing the checks.

A Home Office spokesman said: ‘Illegal working undermines honest business and undercuts local wages – the public won’t stand for it and neither will this government.

‘That’s why we have taken swift action to launch a nationwide crackdown on illegal working, with arrests up by 51 per cent since we took office.

‘On top of that, our Borders Bill is changing the law to end the abuse of flexible working arrangements.

‘For the first time, checks that confirm someone’s immigration status and their right to work will be extended to all companies in the gig economy.’