Northern Ireland Secretary Dr John Reid has criticised what he calls the "daft and extreme" comments made by the Conservative leader over the future of the Sangatte refugee centre.

In a newspaper article, Iain Duncan Smith says not one of 1,300 refugees at the centre in northern France should be allowed to enter Britain.

Duncan Smith said the UK was 'laughing stock'

He said the government should seek a better deal with the French over what to do about Sangatte, which is being blamed for an influx of illegal migrants trying to reach the UK via Channel Tunnel freight trains.

Mr Duncan Smith claimed a reported plan to close the camp in return for Britain taking some refugees from the camp would have French people "laughing at us across breakfast tables all over the country".

All the signals of somebody who's trying to exploit the issue politically

Dr John Reid

He later told the BBC the apparent deal would be "a disaster" and make an existing problem even worse.

But speaking on BBC Radio 5 Live, Dr Reid said that insisting the UK should not take any of the Sangatte refugees was as daft as saying we should take them all.

He added: "I'm afraid that by using the language he did and the substance of what he said Iain Duncan Smith has put himself way on one extreme.

"To take the position that no one of them shall set foot in Britain and the white flag is being flown if we try to reach a reasonable position seems to me to send all the signals of somebody who's trying to exploit the issue politically."

A Downing Street spokesman said that there was little point opening talks with the country's interim government ahead of the French general election in June.

He added that no deal had been struck with the French over the UK taking refugees in exchange for Sangatte being closed.

Ridicule

Writing in the Daily Mail, Mr Duncan Smith claimed the asylum system has buckled under the strain and Sangatte has become a "staging post for people waiting to break the law and enter the UK illegally".

He claimed that French police have all but given up trying to stop the flood of refugees and that the bulk of refugees coming to Britain were economic migrants.

We shouldn't be taking people from the Sangatte camp as part of any deal - France should be taking people back from us because they come from France

Shadow Chancellor Michael Howard

The Tory leader said their presence undermined the prospects of genuine asylum seekers hoping to find a safe haven.

"Not one of those 1,300 should be allowed to set foot in Britain on the terms that seem to be on offer."

Mr Duncan Smith added: "Tony Blair, Jack Straw and David Blunkett have got us into this mess and now they are on the brink of capitulating completely."

Shadow chancellor and MP for Folkestone Michael Howard told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that the current "problems" with immigration were created by the Labour government.

"This is the diplomacy of the madhouse. We shouldn't be taking people from the Sangatte camp as part of any deal - France should be taking people back from us because they come from France," he said.

"If they have a genuine asylum claim there's no reason they shouldn't make it in France and that's exactly what happened when we were in government."

The European Commission's spokesman Jonathan Todd said the EU had to address the issue of asylum because current arrangements were not working.