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"Jacqui Smith is a pretty calm, collected individual and there's no doubt that after Cobra she will come out later today to give a message of reassurance, while stressing the need for vigilance.

"She has all the terrorism machinery now inside the revamped Home Office. That was the whole point of splitting it (spinning off courts and prisons into a separate Justice Ministry headed by Jack Straw).

"But of course this is Brown's first brush with terrorism and he has made clear that security is one of the big things on his agenda."

Three weeks ago Mr Brown gave a speech signalling that he means to be every bit as tough on terror as his predecessor, drafting new laws to empower police to hold suspects for more than 28 days without charge, and to allow questioning to continue after a charge is brought.

Civil liberty campaigners and some MPs have reacted with concern, warning that extending pre-charge detention to as long as 90 days would amount to ``internment''.

But Mr Brown reassured them that he would introduce measures to safeguard liberties, including a requirement for judicial review of a detention every seven days and greater parliamentary oversight of security.

Mr Brown is also planning to summon cross-party talks in the Privy Council on the use of phone-tap evidence in court - something which was resisted by Tony Blair because security services fear it will expose their secret surveillance methods.

He wants to make support for terrorism an aggravating factor which judges can take into account when passing sentence, as they currently do with racially aggravated crime.

And he is expected to increase the £2 billion security budget in the autumn's Comprehensive Spending Review.

Mr Brown said that he was ready to be ``tough in the security measures that are necessary to prevent terrorist incidents in this country''. But he said he would make sure that ``at no point will our British traditions of supporting and defending civil liberties be put at risk".

Earlier plans to extend pre-charge questioning to 90 days were scuppered by a Labour backbench rebellion in 2005, when Mr Blair suffered his first defeat as Prime Minister in the House of Commons.

Today, David Cameron, the Conservative leader, said: “Obviously it’s a very significant event and it’s very worrying. And it shows that we do face a very, very severe threat from terrorism.

“It shows the need to be extremely vigilant. It shows the important work the police and security services do.”

Speaking in Leeds, Mr Cameron went on: “But it also shows the role the public can play in helping to stop these atrocities. And we all have to play our part to try and make sure this country is as safe and secure as it can possibly be.”

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