The first signs of Gordon Brown’s leadership campaign surfaced yesterday after a production company with close ties to Labour bought the website gordonbrown4leader.com .

Silverfish TV, which developed the advertisement for Labour featuring David Cameron as a chameleon, said it had registered the website speculatively in the hope of selling it on once the Chancellor had declared his candidacy.

The company denied that it had been asked to secure the site by anyone in the Labour Party, and a source close to Mr Brown said that it was the “first I have heard of it”.

Mr Brown has not yet formally declared his candidacy, or registered any donations with the Electoral Commission.

Mark Lucas from Silverfish said: “There is a mini-industry around buying domain names. We look into the future and work out what is likely to be useful. We were not commissioned by anyone, but we’d be happy to sell it on to Gordon Brown.

“We do a lot of stuff for the Labour Party, but haven’t been asked to do anything for Mr Brown’s campaign. We have been filming for Labour in the local elections, including Cabinet ministers for films, web clips and archives.”

Clients of Silverfish include the Treasury and the John Smith Trust. However they also work for organisations more regularly associated with arch Blairites such as Progress, as well as Downing Street itself.

Mr Lucas was previously drafted in by Labour to work on the campaign to persuade the public to vote for the euro in the event of a referendum.

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