text: Nigel Farage is touring the country hoping to show how Britain can cope without Europe. But the Ukip leader's campaign came to an embarrassing halt when on a tour of a hinge factory he met an Hungarian worker who spoke no English. After an awkward exchange with Ivan Loncsarevity at the plant in Essex, Mr Farage was quick to insist he did not want to send EU migrants home to stop them taking the jobs of young Britons. Scroll down for video . Ukip leader Nigel Farage had an awkward exchange with Hungarian Ivan Loncsarevity at a hinge factory in Essex . Mr Farage's immigration policy has been shrouded in confusion for weeks, as the party flip-flops between setting a target for net migration and insisting targets do not work. He wants an Australian-style system to set targets for the level of skills needed for someone to come to Britain in search of work. At present no limits can be put on workers from elsewhere in the European Union under freedom of information rules. Mr Farage today visited hinge manufacturer NICO in Clacton, Essex to promote his party's election policies. He was campaigning with Ukip MP Douglas Carswell (left) who hopes to hold the seat he won after defecting from the Tories last year . After meeting several workers, he struggled to make small talk when he met 62-year-old Hungarian Mr Loncsarevity. He has lived in Colchester for five years after travelling to the UK for work, but could not answer any of Mr Farage's questions as he does not speak any English. His colleagues described him as 'relatively low-skilled'. Mr Farage has previously railed against the number of people from elsewhere in Europe working in the UK. Last year he said: 'When you boil it down to Romania, Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, over a million of their workers are in Britain and only 42,000 British citizens are working in those countries.' Mr Farage was campaigning with Ukip MP Douglas Carswell (left) who hopes to hold the seat he won after defecting from the Tories last year . But today he insisted he would not want to send Mr Loncsarevity back to Hungary. 'Ukip has never said anyone should leave the country, so the question is entirely baseless,' he told reporters. 'One of the big problems that we've got in engineering is a real shortage of young people studying engineering to go into trades such as this, which is regrettable. 'We've got rid of technical colleges and encouraged more and more young people to go to university and study degrees which are not directly linked to industry such as this. 'If there's no British person trained to do that job, then that says more about us than them.' NICO's manufacturing manager, Steve Dalton, said that the firm needed to look to Eastern Europe to fill a skills gap and on occasion had flown potential employees from Poland. Mr Dalton said he was not a Ukip supporter but did not oppose the party's proposal of an Australian-style points system designed to limit the number of immigrants. He said: 'There needs to be some controls but presumably, if we needed to fill a skills gap, we would still be able to do that under such a system.' The company employs 130 people, six of whom are migrants from Eastern Europe. Finance director Gillian Hagger said: 'A lot of industries in the UK do need migrant workers. 'The area we're in means we've got a large pool to recruit from but sometimes we find their skills are limited. On those occasions we have had to look further afield, including flying interviewees in from Poland.' Mr Farage was quick to insist he did not want to send EU migrants home to stop them taking the jobs of young Britons . Later Mr Farage visited the town's Copping Community Centre with Douglas Carswell - the first person to be elected as a Ukip MP after defecting from the Conservatives. He met supporters and again spoke of the lack of young British people pursuing careers in manufacturing and leaving engineering firms with a 'genuine shortage' of skilled workers. He said: 'We will say that anyone doing engineering at degree level should not be paying any tuition fees.' In November, Ukip's Mark Reckless suggested that European migrants would only be allowed to stay for a 'fixed period' if Britain chose to leave the EU. Mr Farage later insisted there had been 'confusion' and insisted Ukip respected the 'rule of law and British justice'.
target: Ukip leader lost for words as he met Ivan Loncsarevity at the plant in Essex .
  Struggled for small talk because Mr Loncsarevity speaks little English .
  Farage insisted he did not want to deport migrants if Britain left the EU .