THE two men responsible for securing Britain against the terrorist threat after 9/11 were locked in a bitter personal dispute.

In his memoirs, Lord Stevens portrays Mr Blunkett as an aggressive and confrontational Home Secretary whose word could not be trusted. The two clashed frequently over how best to wage the “war on terror”. Relations reached rock bottom last year when Mr Blunkett criticised Lord Stevens as “weak” and blustering in a biography shortly before he had to resign over the Kimberley Quinn affair.

After the 2001 election Mr Blunkett was appointed as “a new Home Secretary who had no previous experience of dealing with the Met and knew very little about policing”, Lord Stevens writes.

Mr Blunkett adopted “a new, aggressive approach” and “seemed confrontational”. The two men had a number of rows, including a confrontation after 9/11 when Mr Blunkett “raised doubts” about the police’s ability to fight terrorism. Lord Stevens recalls: “I became quite vigorous: the anti-terrorist branch was one part of the organisation that really did work. Immediately after I had spoken I wondered whether I should have given such a forthright reply, but two members of the Cabinet came up and said, ‘well done’.”

In February 2002 Mr Blunkett was reported in a newspaper interview to have said that Lord Stevens had six months to crack down on street crime in London or be replaced.

Lord Stevens says that at a social dinner the night before “there seemed to be no friction . . . and he told the company ‘We stand together or go down together’.” Mr Blunkett denied having made the remarks. But Lord Stevens later established that Mr Blunkett had been quoted accurately.

After two years, Lord Stevens threatened to retaliate. “I eventually rang up two friends close to very senior figures in the Government, and told them that I was not going to stand for any more of it . . . if it went on, I would come out fighting . . . lo and behold, the insults ceased.”

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