Charles Clarke will today aim to convince Labour MPs to support his plans for control orders on terror suspects.

The home secretary will publish a three-page explanatory note on his anti-terror bill to allow MPs to examine the details before a six-hour debate gets under way.

Clarke believes the home secretary of the day should have the power to issue a control order, since he is responsible for national security. But many MPs believe a judge should have the final say.

Mark Oaten, the Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, said: "I am hopeful that the government is prepared to look at this issue of shifting the emphasis from a judge reviewing a decision to taking the initial decision."

But at the weekend, Home Office minister Caroline Flint indicated the government was refusing to budge.

"In terms of national security, it is the government that is responsible for protecting the public," she told BBC Radio 4's the World this Weekend.

"I think it is absolutely right that in those circumstances it is the home secretary, based on the information that he is given."

The Telegraph, however, reports that Clarke could announce plans to give judges a greater role than previously outlined.

A YouGov poll in the same paper finds that 61 per cent of the public agree that national security matters more than the civil liberties of terrorism suspects.