Beleaguered Brown has no ideas says Unison chief

The charge came from Dave Prentis, the leader of the biggest public sector union, Unison, ahead of crucial meetings this month to decide on future policies.

Criticism of the Government's lack of election-winning "big ideas" is also taking place in private by ministers and Labour backbenchers - with some blaming the Prime Minister's leadership.

Mr Prentis timed his intervention to coincide with Labour's national policy forum which starts next week with a brief of shaping ideas for the manifesto.

There has been concern in ministerial circles that the Government has failed to set the agenda with headline-making reforms, allowing union demands for workplace rights to fill the gap.

"We have seen more and more within the party that it's devoid of ideas of how it's going to win the next election," said Mr Prentis.

"We [the unions] are closer to Labour Party members and how they think than some people in Government."

Unison is threatening to axe the £ 1.5million a year that it gives to Labour Party funds - putting extra pressure on the cash-strapped party to bow to their agenda. The unions have deluged the policy forum with 2,000 amendments to policy-documents. At the same time, senior ministers say they are worried that under Mr Brown the Government is failing to dominate the agenda with big ideas.

One Cabinet minister said: "We all thought Gordon was a brilliant policy guru, fizzing with ideas, but it turns out he isn't at all."

Another minister, quoted in the Times, said: "You can have a problem with personality or policy, but the absence of both is pretty dire."

Mr Brown's policies are being contrasted by some MPs with the flow of bold, radical ideas under Tony Blair. Many of the big proposals trumpeted as long-term solutions by No 10 - such as 42-day detention without charge for terrorist suspects and the go-ahead on nuclear power stations - are left-overs from the Blair era.

Mr Brown used his press conference yesterday to insist he was addressing the challenges of the future and that he would not seek short-term relief by bowing to union demands.

"I have made it clear we are not returning to the Seventies or the Eighties, we are not returning to the days of secondary picketing," he said. "We are not returning to trade union legislation which is written by trade unions themselves."