Mike Penning, Tory MP for Hemel Hempstead, Herts,  attacked the Archbishop’s re­marks.

He said: “Rowan Williams is entitled to speak out on issues but he is fundamentally wrong about this. I think he is being perverse.

“My constituents are worried sick about the alcohol driven violence on our streets.  People are worried about young people hanging around street corners. They feel threatened.

“Not all young people are bad but he is missing the point on this one.”

Philip Davies, Tory MP for Shipley, West Yorkshire, said: “The Archbishop is completely out of touch.

“Of course not all groups of youths are hooligans. But some are, and they can be terrifying for adults.

“To pretend that all youngsters are angels who are petrified of adults is a very strange way of looking at this issue.

“I have had experience in my constituency where there were youths outside an Indian restaurant hurling racist
abuse and scaring customers. These young thugs weren’t scared of adults.  They were the ones doing the terrorising.”

Dr Williams’s comments on youth gangs came in an article to mark the publication of a Children’s Society report entitled Good Childhood.

He said: “The sight of young people gathering on streets and in shopping centres is one of the things that can create alarm or suspicion in adults, who think such groups are going to be ­abusive or extreme in their behaviour.

“What may come as a surprise in today’s findings is that many young people themselves feel that they are not safe or welcome in public places.”

He said the Mosquito – audible only to youngsters and placed outside some businesses plagued by yobs – is “a sad example of an indiscriminate and knee-jerk response to a perceived problem, which only deals with symptoms, not causes.”