The chancellor, in an interview with The Sunday Times, said that only a Labour government led by him could be trusted to protect the country, dismissing the Conservatives as not understanding “the scale of the threat we face”.

With security set to rise to the top of the agenda this week with the publication of the Queen’s speech, Brown supported calls yesterday by Britain’s top police officer for a toughening of the country’s anti-terror laws.

The chancellor said he would also create a single “national security budget” so that resources could be switched around quickly. It is a clear sign that he will put security at the heart of next year’s spending review.

His proposed blueprint comes as David Cameron, the Tory leader, sets out his agenda for the war on terror in an article in today’s Sunday Times.
If he became prime minister, Cameron said, he would create a cabinet post specifically responsible for fighting terrorism, establish a national border force to patrol ports and airports and allow the use of telephone intercept evidence in court.

He criticised Labour for introducing ineffectual laws: “We’ve seen an endless proliferation of new measures coming out of the Home Office, many of which end up never being used. I fear we’ll see more of the same in the coming Queen’s speech.”

The debate on Britain’s security was ignited when Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller, the head of MI5, disclosed last week that the security service was investigating
30 active plots in Britain and had identified 200 terrorist networks involving at least 1,600 people.

Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan police commissioner, confirmed the threat in a speech yesterday, citing evidence that up to 120,000 British Muslims tacitly support terrorist activity.

He proposed increasing the length of time that suspects can be held without charge from 28 days, allowing the police to continue to question suspects after they have been charged, and lifting the bar on the use of telephone intercept evidence in court.

Yesterday Brown offered his backing, pointing out that he had already authorised the use of so-called “closed” evidence to allow the assets of suspected terrorists to be frozen. He said he had also indicated that he would favour the extension of the 28-day limit to up to 90 days.

“I completely agree with him,” Brown said. “Given the scale of the threat we face, we must give the security service and the police not just the resources they need, but the powers they need, to gather securely the evidence and use that evidence to gain convictions.”()

He said that having studied the US security system, he had become convinced of the need to change the way that Britain manages the fight against terrorism. “I believe we need a national security strategy, updated each year for changing circumstances,” Brown said.

“It must be both domestic and international. It must be about the fight for hearts and minds as well as conventional counter-terrorism.”

Detailing his plans, Cameron said that, if elected to power, he would appoint a minister solely responsible for combating terrorism as a full member of the cabinet alongside the home secretary.

“Action against terrorism deserves a dedicated seat at the top table,” he said.

He repeated Conservative promises to abandon the government’s controversial identity cards scheme, saying that the security services were stretched and the money
would be better spent on increasing surveillance of known terror suspects.

Also backing the use of intercept evidence, Cameron said: “It must be intensely frustrating to listen to tapes of terrorists plotting massacres, yet be unable to lock them up because such evidence is currently inadmissible.”

Brown dismissed the idea of appointing a special minister to fight terrorism. “Every minister and every agency of government must take responsibility for security — each of them must play their part,” he said.

“But, ultimately, because the fight against terrorism must be fought both at home and abroad, it is the prime minister who must take the lead, as Tony Blair has done. If you are prime minister, you cannot devolve responsibility for protecting the nation. It must always be your first priority.”

The chancellor has avoided reciprocating the personal attacks made on him by Cameron but he hit out at the Tory leader’s failure to back identity cards, saying: “You can’t protect your borders or conduct effective surveillance if you don’t have a proper system of identity management.”

In a speech in Germany this weekend, Sir Ian Blair cited a poll which suggested that 120,000 Muslims — 6% of the Muslim population — believed the July 7 suicide bombings in London in 2005 had been justified. “We face a war,” he said, adding that Muslim extremists were “motivated by politics of a twisted sort”.

“Every week the number of targets against which our services are operating in Britain increases,” he said.

His demands for intercept evidence to be accepted in court add to a campaign by law enforcement figures. He also argued for legislation to ban the burning of flags and effigies and to prevent demonstrators covering their faces.

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