London mayor Ken Livingstone has pledged he will seek to use funds provided by Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez to subsidise public transport for failed asylum seekers.
All four leading candidates in the London mayoral election were asked to back a proposal to pay for travel to immigration offices for people whose asylum application has been rejected.
Mr Livingstone said he could foresee legal problems with doing this but had an idea for a way around it if he is re-elected on May 1. He proposed using money from a controversial deal he signed with a Venezuelan oil company in February last year in return for providing expertise from Greater London Authority officials.
The Labour Mayor said: "(Mr Chavez) has given us £14 million that allows people on benefits to get half-price travel on the bus. I would ask him if he is prepared to amend the scheme to cover failed asylum seekers."
Mr Livingstone was speaking alongside his principal election rivals Boris Johnson, Brian Paddick and Sian Berry at an "accountability assembly" organised by London Citizens, an alliance of 100 grassroots community groups in the capital.
Some 2,500 delegates called on the prospective mayors to support four proposals intended to improve life in the capital.
All four candidates backed calls for illegal immigrants to be given regular legal status.
Mr Johnson, the Conservative nominee, spoke of his own family's immigrant roots. He said his Muslim great-grandfather, who fled to Britain from Turkey, would be "very proud" that he was now standing for mayor of London.
Mr Livingstone said it was a "tragic miscalculation" on the part of the Labour government when it came to power in 1997 not to have an "immediate amnesty for everybody".
Mr Paddick said he was very proud that the Lib-Dems were alone among the major political parties in supporting normalising illegal immigrants.