The tycoon warns the young driver, whose team was put up for sale at the beginning of the month after spending £300 million to achieve only ninth place on the podium, to resist accepting a seat with a lower rate team.
Ecclestone said: “He should be in any of the top teams. I’d rather him wait to get in one of those than race in an uncompetitive car.”
“It’s a pity because he’s committed to Honda for three years.”
Although the last two years at Honda have hardly enhanced Button’s reputation as he battled with the likes of Toro Rosso and Spyker/Force India, the Briton is determined to be back on the grid next season, despite Honda pulling the plug on its F1 team before Christmas. His current options appear to rest on either a buyer being found for the Brackley-based team - with which he has a three-year contract - or Toro Rosso deviating from the drivers it has been testing all winter and offering him one of its two seats for 2009.
Button, meanwhile, appears to have ruled out breaking an F1 career that began with Williams in 2000 and has since seen him race for Benetton, BAR and Honda, but there are no obvious openings at any of the leading teams unless the global financial crisis forces them to field a third car - which would happen should grid numbers drop below current levels.
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