Robert Jenrick called for an end to the “era of mass migration” to help tackle Islamist extremism in Britain.
The former immigration minister warned it is not possible to “integrate people at this pace”.
Asked about Rishi Sunak’s address to the nation on extremism, he told GB News: “You cannot resolve this problem, build a more united country, which is what the Prime Minister was calling for, a more cohesive country built around British values, unless you end this era of mass migration.
“We’ve been living in a time where up to a million people have arrived in our country every year and it’s impossible to successfully integrate so many people.
“The level of migration that we’ve experienced as a country over the last 30 years has been unprecedented and that needs to change.
“I think it’s an important part of the solution to say you can’t integrate people at this pace and we have to row back on that now.
“We have to move to a system where immigration is controlled and orderly and the numbers are just very significantly fewer.”
The senior Conservative MP warned that people do not speak up for fear of being branded Islamophobic.
He said: “Many people are too afraid to intervene in this debate because either they want to pretend this doesn’t exist or they know it does but they’re afraid of being labelled an Islamophobe and that is not a healthy way for us to proceed.”
He also insisted that Ashfield MP Lee Anderson, who lost the Tory whip after refusing to apologise for claiming that London Mayor Sadiq Khan was controlled by Islamists, is not an Islamophobe.
Mr Jenrick said: “He made comments which were mistaken, he’s clarified those now, and I think we need to move on.
“The problem with what happened over the last week is that it’s closed down the debate on the really important issue which is that we have a problem in this country with Islamist extremism and we need a proper national conversation about that and a strategy to tackle it.”
It comes after the Prime Minister used an address to the nation last Friday to warn that democracy is being targeted by extremists.
Speaking at a lectern outside the doors of No 10 Downing Street, Mr Sunak warned about the current situation in Britain in the wake of the the October 7 terror attacks by Hamas against Israel.
