The Tories could limit immigration from countries with an “alien culture”, Robert Jenrick has suggested.
Mr Jenrick warned “some” of the “millions of people” arriving in the UK have “medieval attitudes towards women”.
The comments provoked a furious backlash on Tuesday, with some claiming Kemi Badenoch should sack the shadow justice secretary.
Asked if he stood by the comments, first made over the weekend, the senior Tory told GB News: “Yes, absolutely.
“We have seen millions of people enter the UK in recent years and some of them have backward, frankly medieval attitudes towards women.
“We're talking about thousands, potentially tens of thousands of young girls, being tortured and raped.
“I will not disguise or sanitize my language simply to ensure that some people are not offended. We must ensure we speak the truth. We got into this mess because people tried to hide away from the truth and tip-toe around this issue.”
Mr Jenrick also claimed that Pakistani men are “over-represented in those who are involved in the grooming gangs”.
The three most notorious child sex gang cases – Rotherham, Rochdale and Telford – all had preparators predominantly of Pakistani and South Asian decent.
Mr Jenrick stood by his claim that the grooming gangs scandal “started with the onset of mass migration”.
Asked if he was saying that the nation's immigration policy should be changed to stop people with such attitudes from coming to the UK, Mr Jenrick told the BBC: “I think that we have to be very careful about who is coming into this country, the scale and pace of that immigration so that we can have a much more successful integration policy than we have today.”
He added: “I have always said, and it is a point made by Kemi Badenoch, the leader of my party, that not all cultures are equal. We should be very careful about who is coming into this country and the scale of immigration.”
Daisy Cooper, the deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats, said: “Robert Jenrick's attempt to exploit this appalling scandal for his own political gain is completely shameless. He didn't lift a finger to help the victims when a minister, now he's jumping on the bandwagon and acting like a pound shop Farage.
“Kemi Badenoch should sack him as shadow justice secretary and condemn his divisive comments, instead of letting him run a leadership campaign under her nose.”
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch is pushing for a national inquiry after tech billionaire Elon Musk used his X platform to launch a barrage of online attacks on the government over the issue.
Prof Alexis Jay produced a report on grooming gangs in Rotherham in 2014 and then chaired the national inquiry into various forms of child sexual abuse which was reported in 2022.
The slew of messages on X from Mr Musk on the issue attacking Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and safeguarding minister Jess Phillips came after the Government declined to commission an inquiry into sexual exploitation in Oldham, insisting it should be locally-led.
Prof Jay declined to answer when asked whether she felt US billionaire Mr Musk knew what was going on in Oldham, but added: “I have heard very little in the last few days about the appalling and lifelong effects that child sexual abuse can have on people. .”
She said she is pleased that the subject matter and the recommendations made by her inquiry are getting attention “but this is definitely not the way I would have chosen for it to happen”.
She acknowledged that plans for new legislation announced by Home Secretary Yvette Cooper on Monday had happened quicker than they might otherwise have done.
“It (the row) may well have given it some kind of impetus to move forward,” she said.
Prof Jay's inquiry noted that “many of the high-profile child sexual exploitation prosecutions have involved groups of men from minority ethnic communities” but a lack of data means it is “impossible to know whether any particular ethnic group is over-represented as perpetrators of child sexual exploitation by networks”.
Child groomers are to be given longer prison sentences under tougher laws.
Grooming will be treated as a statutory aggravating factor when judges sentence offenders for specified child sex offenses including rape and sexual assault.
It will mean judges will be required by law to hand down an additional length of time in jail on top of the sentence the groomer receives for any sexual offense committed against the victim.
Downing Street on Tuesday insisted it has not been forced to implement some of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse's recommendations amid the ongoing row.
The Prime Minister's official spokesperson said: “The Government has been working since it came into office on measures to protect children, to halve violence against women and girls.
“On mandatory reporting, the Prime Minister and Home Secretary called for these changes 10 years ago. Work on the mandatory reporting criminal offence, the write-round for that kicked off last year and obviously has just concluded ahead of the announcement, so obviously that work's been ongoing for some time.”
He added: “It's important the government explains to the public how seriously the government is taking this issue, so I think it's natural in response to the recent coverage the government explains what the government's been doing in this space.
“As Alexis Jay spoke about… the government has been engaged with her, with victims' groups, since the election it's been working on a number of these measures.”