Jack Straw provoked anger yesterday by suggesting that community relations would be helped if Islamic women did not wear full veils.

The Leader of the Commons disclosed that for the past year, he had been asking women who visited his constituency office to remove their veils so that he could see them face-to-face. He always made sure that a female member of staff accompanied him, and so far, not a single constituent had refused to lift her veil, he said.

Mr. Straw said wearing the full veil was bound to make “better, positive relations” between communities more difficult, as it could be seen “as a visible statement of separation and difference.” He had felt “uncomfortable” whenever a woman had worn one in his Blackburn constituency office.

A prominent Islamic scholar described his comments as “untimely” and giving out “a mixed message.” Sheik Ibrahim Nogra of the Muslim Council of Britain said: “On the one hand, he says this is a free country. On the other, he is denying that free choice to a woman who chooses to wear the veil. Does Mr. Straw mean that people should give up certain cultural and religious customs and practices simply because a vast majority of the country do not share them? That is calling for assimilation. That is saying that one culture or one way of life is superior to another. If we are truly multicultural, we have to accept that there will be women who want to dress in this way.”

Sheik Ibrahim, who trained as an imam, said: “I have a beard, and I wear a traditional long shirt. Sometimes, I wear a turban and a hat. Am I going to be his next subject of concern?” He said he welcomed a debate on the issue but argued that Muslims “would want ownership of the outcome of that debate.”

The chairman of the social and family affairs committee of the Muslim Council of Great Britain, Reefat Drabu, said: “If Mr. Straw thinks this is going to break down barriers, it isn’t. If anything, it is going to alienate Muslim women and be a catalyst for more of them to wear the veil and prove a point.”

She added: “If you are trying to build bridges, you need to listen to what Muslims are saying. The problems that alienate women are to do with foreign policy, and no one seems to take any notice of that. This country is supposed to celebrate diversity. That is the wonderful thing about this country: that it accepts, that it is tolerant. Women who wear the veil are making the statement that they are separate from society, and that is why they wear it.”

A former foreign secretary who has tried to foster strong links with the Islamic community, Mr. Straw said: “The Muslim Council of Great Britain has made clear that this is an issue that theologically the Islamic community is divided on. Most of my Muslim constituents don’t mind if I ask them to lift their veils.”

Mr. Straw said he began “mulling over” the matter a year ago after a veiled constituent attended one of his surgeries and said she was pleased to meet him face-to-face.

“‘Chance would be a fine thing,’ I thought to myself but did not say aloud,” he wrote in his weekly column for the Lancashire Telegraph. “It was not the first time I had conducted an interview with someone in a full veil, but this particular encounter, though very polite and respectful on both sides, got me thinking.” That was partly because of the incongruity of the woman’s “entirely English accent” and wholly British education — both indications of commonality — and the fact that she was wearing a veil, he said.

Mr. Straw said: “I decided that I would not just sit there the next time a lady turned up to see me in a full veil — and I haven’t.

“I explain that this is a country built on freedoms. I defend absolutely the right of any woman to wear a headscarf. As for the full veil, wearing it breaks no laws. I go on to say that I think, however, the conversation would be of greater value if the lady took the covering from her face.

“I can’t recall a single occasion when a lady has refused. Most seem relieved that I have asked.”

The Bishop of Burnley, the Right Reverend John Goddard, said he hoped that Mr. Straw’s comments would act “as a catalyst for debate and real dialogue.” He added: “We must work for integration, not a parallel existence, and to do that both the majority and the minority cultures need to change.”