GETTY Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby said concern about the migrant crisis was 'very reasonable'

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THE British people have suffered “terrible” damage from mass migration because the country’s “elites” shut down debate about the issue for so long, leading Conservative Iain Duncan Smith said today. The former Tory leader welcomed Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby’s comments that it was “very reasonable” for people to be anxious and “absolutely outrageous” to brand such concerns racist. But Mr Duncan Smith suggested such admissions had come too late from the British Establishment. He said: “For far too many years... the elites really all said ‘it is terrible to talk about immigration and if you do you are racist’. “So they shut down the debate for many, many years.

GETTY Iain Duncan Smith said under Blair, immigration debates became synonymous with racism

I can even remember back at the time when Tony Blair was Prime Minister, to even mention immigration was to be accused of being a racist Iain Duncan Smith

“I can even remember back at the time when Tony Blair was Prime Minister, to even mention immigration was to be accused of being a racist. “That accusation probably silenced legitimate discussion and... what happens is you push this debate to the margins, which is what you are seeing in Europe. “And then political parties and people with very poor intentions and rather nasty motives then start to take this issue, and that’s where you lose control.

GETTY More than 1million people have arrived in Europe in the last year

“So this should have been the case many, many years before but shutting it down has been terrible for the British people.” The Work and Pensions Secretary told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme it was also wrong to brand people with concerns anti-migration, when what they wanted was controlled migration to enable Britain to get the talented people it needed but at a rate which communities and public services could handle. Proper control was also required to avoid “stirring up hatreds” of the sort now seen in Germany after it opened its doors to migrants from the Middle East and Africa, he said.

GETTY Iain Duncan Smith has recently come out in support of a Brexit

Mr Duncan Smith also stressed that if Britain stayed in the EU it got only temporary protection from being outside the Continent’s passport-free Schengen travel zone because once migrants - some of whom could be potential terrorists - got new passports from host EU countries they had total freedom to visit the UK. David Cameron’s official spokeswoman hit back at Mr Duncan Smith - who is a leader of the campaign for Britain to leave the EU - telling reporters: “There has been a debate (about migration) in this country for a number of years.