Robert Jenrick has suggested he regrets ordering murals of cartoon characters at a children’s asylum centre be painted over, and would not do it again.
The Conservative leadership contender reportedly made the order when he was immigration minister in the last government.
He faced a backlash when news broke in July last year that he had ordered the paintings be covered up at an accommodation centre for unaccompanied child migrants in Kent.
The incident has faced renewed scrutiny since Mr Jenrick joined the race to succeed Rishi Sunak as Tory leader.
Mr Jenrick, one of the final two in the contest alongside Kemi Badenoch, suggested he now regretted his decision.
He told LBC he took the action as he was “very worried at the time and continue to be about those people who are adults, coming into our country illegally and posing as children”.
He added: “So I did feel that it was important that at the initial point of arrival, we treat these places as law-enforcement environments with a view to trying to weed out those people who are actually just posing as children.
“I think that was the right decision, but of course there are lessons to be learned from it, and I probably would have done things differently if I had my time again.”
Pressed if this meant he would not do it again, he said: “No I wouldn’t, but what I did want to do then and I feel just as passionately about today, is that we have got to weed out those people who are posing as children when they first arrive.”
Mr Jenrick earlier said he “wouldn’t want to do anything other than to treat children who come to our country in a compassionate way”.
He said his work on closing down “rudimentary” hotels used to accommodate child migrants pointed to his compassion.
Elsewhere in the LBC interview, Mr Jenrick said he stood by his claim that UK special forces were killing rather than capturing terrorists for fear of having to release them under human rights law.
Mr Jenrick has used the claim, contested by his former leadership rival Tom Tugendhat, as a means of justifying his policy proposal of the UK leaving the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
Asked if he would agree to Mr Tugendhat’s calls to pull down a video in which he made the claim, Mr Jenrick said: “I have great respect for Tom and I would like him to serve in my shadow cabinet if I am lucky enough to lead the party.
“I continue to stand by the remarks that we made.
“The point that I was making then, which has been defended by a group of senior former special forces officers recently in a letter in The Times, was that it can’t be right that our military planners are having their discretion fettered as a result of the ECHR and our human rights apparatus.”
The Newark MP also suggested he had “great respect” for both Ms Badenoch and James Cleverly, and that there was room for both of them in his top team if he wins the leadership.
Mr Jenrick had earlier denied he will return towards centre ground Conservatism if he is made Tory leader.
“I haven’t said that, no,” he said when asked if he had told some Tories he would move towards the centre by BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
Mr Jenrick said he did not believe left and right labels were “at all relevant”, adding: “What I want to see is the Conservative Party occupy what I describe as the common ground of British politics.”
