NEW police powers to clamp down on animal rights and other extremist protesters are to be launched later this year.
The government will bring forward legislation designed to ban demonstrators from targeting the homes of scientists who perform animal research, but it could also be used to cover anti-Iraq protesters who camp outside parliament and potentially even tabloid journalists who “doorstep” celebrities.

David Blunkett, the home secretary, is said to be pushing for the bill to be included in the Queen’s speech in November, when the last parliamentary session before a likely spring general election begins.

Lord Sainsbury, the science minister, is backing the bill, which has been inspired by the activities of campaigners against the animal testing firm Huntingdon Life Sciences. Ministers also fear that some protesters in Parliament Square pose a potential security risk to MPs.

The proposal has caused some alarm. Nick Raynsford, the local government minister, is understood to have written to colleagues asking if the ban would also cover the press.

The main target of the new law, however, is likely to be animal rights extremists. Patricia Hewitt, the trade secretary, confirmed last night that the law would be designed to stop “terrorists and thugs” demonstrating outside private homes.

She also promised the government would fully back an animal research facility under construction in Oxford that has been targeted by protesters.

A senior police officer has been put in charge of gathering intelligence on some of the extremists running the protests, which extend from peaceful marches to vandalism and vicious attacks on individuals.

A demonstration in Oxford yesterday organised by the animal rights group Speak passed off without incident.

One of the activists organising the Oxford protests is linked to extremists behind a series of firebomb attacks, a Sunday Times investigation has established.

Robert Cogswell, 39, a co-head of Speak, has donated money to the North American branch of the Animal Liberation Front (ALF). He has also hosted ALF propaganda on a website he runs that provides links to an ALF site describing terrorist techniques such as bomb making. ALF’s campaigns have caused millions of pounds of damage to private houses and businesses.

Last week Speak, which advocates only peaceful protest, claimed a “great victory” after Walter Lilly, the main company building the £18m Oxford project, pulled out. The company had been under pressure from activists who targeted executives’ homes. RMC, which supplied cement for the pro-ject, has also withdrawn from Oxford. Its decision followed an arson attack that wrecked three of its lorries.

Companies have become so worried about extremists that a £25m bounty has been offered by City firms for information leading to the ringleaders’ arrest.

It is understood the government is considering whether to place ALF’s British arm on the list of illegal terrorist groups, alongside organisations such as the IRA and Al-Qaeda.

In a congressional statement this year, the FBI in America described the ALF as “a serious domestic terrorist threat”.

It was this organisation to which the Barry Horne fund, run by Cogswell, who lives in London, has given money.

Last week Cogswell denied his payment to American ALF activists, made between 2001 and 2003, was to fund illegal actions. “It was not that much money, just a couple of hundred pounds to help them out. They were just the legal fund for the ALF and did not participate in actions themselves,” he said.

Cogswell, who works part-time in the accounts department of a magazine, also runs a website and magazine called Arkangel. ALF activists have posted a “communiqué” on this site announcing their arson attack on RMC. Their message warns: “Collaboration in animal torture at Oxford or anywhere else will not be tolerated.”

Arkangel also includes a link to an ALF site publishing terror manuals. One, entitled The Animal Liberation Primer, gives details of how to make incendiary bombs and avoid arrest.

Cogswell was charged after a 1992 sting operation in which an undercover police agent sold him handguns. Although he was found not guilty of committing any crime, last week he admitted buying the weapons as part of his animal rights activities. “There was no intention to use them,” he said. “I had infiltrated a dog-fighting gang, which obviously had criminal elements. It was a way of getting deeper into their confidence.”

The co-founder of Speak is Mel Broughton, 44, a landscape gardener from Northampton. Broughton was jailed for four years in 1997 for possessing incendiary bombs.

Another animal rights extremist, the American Jerry Vlasak, is due to address a conference near Tonbridge, Kent, in September. He describes himself as a “scientific adviser” to Speak. Vlasak said last night the “use of force” was legitimate and claimed the murder of scientists would be an “effective tactic”.

“There has always been the necessity to back up the non-violent moves with violent tactics,” he said.

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