“Talking” CCTV cameras that will reprimand and embarrass those up to no good in full public view are to be introduced in a number of locations across the UK, it was announced today.

The move - to be brought in to 20 areas nationwide - will involve council workers in a control centre commanding loudspeakers that are fitted to cameras. It follows a trial scheme in Middlesbrough in which 12 such devices were fitted across the town, and used to stop vandals in their tracks and shame litterbugs into picking up their rubbish.

The plans have met fierce criticism from opponents, who described the idea as “Big Brother gone mad.” There are an estimated five million CCTV cameras in the country - one for every 12 people, and a recent study from the Government’s privacy watchdog, the Information Commissioner, has warned that Britain risked "sleepwalking" into a surveillance society.

But Home Secretary John Reid, who has ploughed in almost £500,000 to fund the expansion of the cameras, insisted the scheme had shown itself to work in addressing anti-social behaviour.

“This is a hugely popular scheme in Middlesbrough and the vast majority of the people here are right behind it,” he told GMTV. “It helps counter things like litter through drunk or disorderly behaviour, gangs congregating.

“They are the sorts of things that make people’s lives a misery. Anything that tackles that is better.

“We want more police officers and we want more neighbourhood policing. There are always people who will claim when we do that it’s a ’police society’. It isn’t. It’s a society where the vast majority of law-abiding citizens are doing their utmost to respect each other.

“There is always a minority and this is a way of trying to embarrass them, short of taking people to court, short of getting the police involved, to make sure it is a better local society.”

At schools in the 20 areas, competitions are being held for children to become the “voice” of the new cameras.

Mr Reid denied that the new scheme was a substitute for putting more police officers on the beat, insisting that it was an complementary means of dealing with anti-social acts. “We’ve got more powers than ever before, more resources than ever before. This is just an additional thing,” he said.

“The vast majority of people are pretty decent. But if people persistently refuse to do this we have got pictures, which provide evidence and the police can be called. We hope it doesn’t come to that. Again it saves police time and of course it is not a substitute for having police on the beat.”

The expansion of the scheme comes days after the publication of a report by the country's leading engineers, in which they warned that CCTV footage could become available for public consumption.

The study by the Royal Academy of Engineering – entitled Dilemmas of Privacy and Surveillance Challenges of Technological Change - said that because footage from CCTV cameras could be digitised and potentially stored for ever, that necessitated greater scrutiny of the controlling networks.

"Given this potential, it cannot be guaranteed that surveillance images will remain private, or will not be altered, misused or manipulated," the report said.

And a Home Office study published four years ago concluded better street lighting was seven times more effective at cutting crime than CCTV. The report suggested cameras cut crime by 4 per cent overall and just 2 per cent in urban areas – a “small degree” compared to improved lighting in public spaces, which made crime plummet by 30 per cent.

The exception however, was CCTV in car parks, which led to a significant 41 per cent fall in crime, the academic study noted.

The 21 areas which have received grants for the talking CCTV proposals are: Southwark; Barking and Dagenham; Reading; Thanet; Harlow; Norwich; Ipswich; Plymouth; Gloucester; Derby; Northampton; Mansfield; Nottingham; Coventry; Sandwell; Wirral; Blackpool; Salford; Middlesbrough; South Tyneside; and Darlington.

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