Theresa May’s new housing adviser said there was “no such crime” as date rape and claimed sexual harassment “just means sexual advances made by the unattractive”.

A day after revealing that Conservative philosopher Roger Scruton said homosexuality was not normal and that Islamophobia was “invented”, BuzzFeed News has unearthed footage of a lecture he gave in the US in 2005 in which he said women who made date rape allegations were actually withdrawing consent in retrospect because “the whole thing went too quickly”.

The prime minister is now under growing pressure from opposition parties to remove Scruton from his post as chair of the government’s new buildings commission, which was announced by housing secretary James Brokenshire on Saturday.

Discussing courtship during his lecture titled “Sexual Morality for Heathens” at Rice University in Houston, Texas, in 2005, Scruton said: “Whole new crimes have come into existence, like this supposed crime of ‘date rape’. What that means is — of course there is no such crime — but nevertheless, when a woman cries ‘date rape’ what she means is ‘the whole thing went too quickly’, you know, ‘I was not prepared’, and so consent is withdrawn as it were in retrospect.”

He acknowledged during the lecture that his words were “extremely controversial”.

He went on to make similar remarks about sexual harassment, which he dismissed as mere “impoliteness” and claimed was a “huge injustice” against those accused.

He told the audience: “Likewise, the charge of sexual harassment. This was never made in the past. It was called impoliteness if somebody put his hand on your knee prematurely, or if it was the wrong hand. But nowadays, of course, ‘sexual harassment’ just means sexual advances made by the unattractive, who are the majority, so there is a huge injustice in this.”