The former Conservative chancellor Ken Clarke has dismissed the row about Britain’s passports being printed abroad as “nationalist nonsense”.

The government faced a backlash last week when it emerged that the Franco-Dutch firm Gemalto had won the contract to print Britain’s post-Brexit blue passports, beating British-based De La Rue, which had also bid for the work.

The former international development secretary Priti Patel called the decision “perverse”, and Labour’s shadow Brexit secretary, Keir Starmer, said on Sunday: “The passport is such an important issue of course it should be a British company.”

Clarke said there had been a “childlike, jingoistic element to this debate”, since it emerged last week that the job of printing Britain’s new dark blue, post-Brexit passport would be handed to Gemalto.

He was speaking in the House of Commons, as the Labour MP Liz Twist, whose Blaydon constituency includes the De La Rue plant, asked an urgent question of Home Office minister Caroline Nokes about the decision.

Ken Clarke said there had been a ‘childlike, jingoistic element’ to the passport debate. Photograph: Parliamentlive.tv

Twist said she had recently visited the factory, where workers produce the current British passports, “with great pride”.

Nokes said civil servants had complied with EU and international laws – including those set down by the World Trade Organization. “Her Majesty’s Passport Office has undertaken a rigorous, fair and open contest,” she said.

She said 20% of existing passports were already printed abroad, which had not created any security issues – and the winning bid had provided “significant benefits both in terms of value for money and product innovation”.

Clarke pointed out that De La Rue “makes a great deal of money for this country by printing passports and currencies for other countries”, because it “wins fair, international contracts” – and it would be “totally ridiculous to abandon that principle in order to give in to nationalist nonsense which ought to be ignored”.

Nokes agreed with him, saying: “We wish to be a global, outward-looking trading nation.”

Labour’s shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, rejected the government’s decision and warned about the impact on workers. She said: “Far from taking back control, it seems we can’t take back control of where our passports are printed.” She called for the government to re-examine the decision.

The Daily Mail led its Friday edition with a front-page story about a “wave of fury” about the decision, and an editorial, also beginning on page one, which asked why those who made the decision “hate our country”.

Martin Sutherland, the chief executive of De La Rue, called on Theresa May and Amber Rudd to visit the company’s factory in Gateshead, to “explain to a dedicated workforce why they think this is a sensible decision, to offshore the manufacture of a British icon”.

The Home Office has insisted awarding the contract to Gemalto would save taxpayers £120m over five years. The part of the contract that involves the public’s personal data will be carried out in the UK.

The prime minister’s spokesman also stressed that Gemalto had a strong record on cybersecurity. “The preferred bidder demonstrated that they meet all government cybersecurity standards. Those will continue to be further tested and assessed during implementation,” he said.

Asked about the decision last week, May’s spokesman said ministers were unlikely to change their minds, even if De La Rue does protest during the 10-day period.

“During that time bidders are given the opportunity to legally challenge that decision, but we feel the chosen company demonstrated that they would be best able to meet the needs of our passport service,” he said.

“We needed a high-quality and secure product which gets the best value for money for the taxpayer.”