Nigel Hastilow had to resign as Tory candidate for Halesowen and Rowley Regis last November after implying that Enoch Powell was right about immigration.
Mr Hastilow has returned to the subject in an article for The Sunday Telegraph to promote his forthcoming book.
In many ways, he writes, Powell was right:
"Powell remains the only nationally known politician to have had the courage to question an immigration policy which was moderately under control 40 years ago, but certainly is not any more. He was right to argue that towns and cities were changing before people's eyes as a result of immigration and that those who lived in them had never been consulted. That, surely, is the most pertinent point of all. Whatever the accuracy of Powell's predictions, and however strong his language, his main argument was that the country was "undergoing the total transformation to which there is no parallel in a thousand years of English history". That is more true today than it was four decades ago. The level of immigration in the intervening years has been higher than Powell foresaw; the consequences are more far-reaching. One of the most obvious is the demand for land, infrastructure and housing. Across Britain, local battles are taking place over plans to build three million more houses to accommodate our ever-expanding population."
He accuses mainstream politicians of a "conspiracy of silence" on the issue of immigration:
"For many politicians, immigration is the subject which dare not speak its name. That's why so many people feel betrayed. Their elected representatives refuse to articulate the voters' concerns with anything approximating honesty. The conspiracy of silence among mainstream politicians is calculated to drive decent men and women into the arms of extremists. The BNP is bound to flourish when anyone who tries to discuss immigration openly is howled down by cries of "racist"."
