Peter Hain has criticised Tories and Liberal Democrats who support Britain joining the single currency.

Speaking on Breakfast with Frost yesterday, the Welsh secretary said that Lord Heseltine, the former deputy prime minister, and Charles Kennedy, the Liberal Democrat leader, are "euro fanatics" because they want to join the currency immediately.

Hain argued: "We don't think we should rush in madly, like, for example, Michael Heseltine and Charles Kennedy have said. Nor should we rule it out for ever, as Iain Duncan Smith has said. Both of those positions are nonsense positions. The common sense position is to say, yes, we ought to be in the single currency in the future but we've got to do it in a careful, cautious, practical fashion."

Both Heseltine and Kennedy claimed that the Welsh secretary was misrepresenting their position.

Hain will on Friday call for EU partners to adopt "a new agenda" on social policy at a convention in Brussels. He will promote a policy paper that seeks full employment and high standards of worker protection.