GORDON BROWN will attempt to trump David Cameron on green issues by announcing that he will create five new environmentally friendly towns when he becomes prime minister.

The chancellor, now certain to succeed Tony Blair and enter No 10 on June 27, will tomorrow set out his plan to build 100,000 houses in the five eco-towns, likely to be dubbed “Brown towns”.

The idea, his first detailed policy announcement since declaring his candidacy for the Labour leadership on Friday, is crucial to putting increased home ownership at the heart of his premiership.

The new towns — with up to 20,000 homes in each — are modelled on the “green” developments pioneered by Prince Charles. They will be built on brownfield sites, the first of which will be at the abandoned Oakington Barracks in Cambridgeshire.

Councils are to be invited to bid for the other four new towns. About 40 have already expressed an interest.

Each of the new homes in the five towns will be built to zero-rated carbon standards and will be exempt from stamp duty. All their energy supplies will be generated locally from sustainable sources, such as solar and wind power. The towns will have new road and rail links and will include zero-carbon schools and health centres.

The detailed plans have been drafted by Yvette Cooper, the housing minister and a key Brown ally tipped for promotion to the cabinet this summer.

Speaking to Labour activists in Kent yesterday, Brown gave a hint of his plans and dismissed suggestions by potential “Nimby” opponents that he would be “concreting over the countryside”.

“If we are to meet the aspirations of every young couple to do the best for themselves and their children, then we need to build new homes and we need to deliver well-planned, green and prosperous communities where they will want to live.

“And I say to those who always say ‘yes, but not here’, you are denying people their rightful aspirations and you are condemning our children never to put a foot on the housing ladder.”

Labour sources said that Cameron, who has made green policies a central tenet of his leadership, will now be faced with the political choice of backing Brown’s plans or siding with Conservative councils opposed to house-building in their area.

Brown believes that increasing home ownership can become one of the central themes of his premiership. With 1.8m more homeowners than in 1997, he is on track to achieve his target of 2m under a Labour government.

Yesterday Brown unveiled other elements of his leadership manifesto, which he will launch after nominations close on Thursday. He will be uncontested if two left-wing MPs — Michael Meacher and John McDonnell — cannot agree on who should challenge him.

The chancellor said he wanted to press ahead with some of Tony Blair’s reforms of public services, including the NHS. He said he wanted to make access to healthcare an “immediate” domestic priority, outlining plans for greater access to “walk-in” centres and electronic prescriptions to save time and money for patients.

He also revealed that he wanted to extend opening hours of GP surgeries and the NHS Direct online and call centre programme, particularly those who could not attend during office hours.

Sources close to Brown said he would not seek to reverse the city academies building scheme, which Blair will announce tomorrow is to be extended. They pointed out that the Treasury minister Ed Balls, a close ally of Brown’s, had met Lord Adonis, the schools minister and architect of the scheme, to discuss the issue.

Brown also scotched suggestions he might scrap Blair’s identity cards scheme. He also said he would be visiting Iraq soon to “make my own assessment of the situation”, although he refused to outline any fresh timetable for withdrawing British troops.

Speculation is growing in government legal circles that Brown may sack Lord Goldsmith, the attorney-general, when he reshuffles the cabinet in July, possibly replacing him with Lord Grabiner, a respected figure in the profession.

Today Brown will debate with Meacher and McDonnell at the first hustings meeting. The two MPs will decide on Monday which of them can muster the necessary 44 votes to take part in the leadership contest. Yesterday, John Prescott, who announced his own resignation as deputy prime minister on Thursday, warned the six candidates who are running for his job that if successful they are likely only to be deputy party leader, not necessarily deputy prime minister.

“I think some of them think they are running for deputy prime minister,” Prescott told The Sunday Times. “But that’s at the PM’s discretion.”

Prescott urged Meacher and McDonnell not to challenge Brown, just for the sake of denying the chancellor a simple coronation. “Who would want to vote for someone who is going to lose in the final analysis anyway? It’s cuckoo daft!”

Meanwhile, a YouGov poll for The Sunday Times today shows that Blair is leaving office on a relatively high note but that Brown faces an uphill struggle. Labour’s poll rating has climbed to 34%, its best since September, four points behind the Tories on 38%; the Liberal Democrats are on 15%. However, the Tory poll lead widens to 10 points, 42% to 32%, when people are asked how they would vote if Brown was Labour leader. Blair can also draw comfort from the fact that, in net terms, people say he has been a good prime minister and by three to one that they believe him when he said he always did what he thought was right.

A significant majority, 51% to 39%, think Brown should call an immediate general election when he becomes prime minister.

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