Ministers 'to ditch sky marshals plan'

Controversial plans to put armed sky marshals on domestic flights are close to being ditched by the Government.

The moves to have armed police on board flights were opposed by pilots, and today it emerged that talks aimed at calming their fears are now "in the long grass".

The Department for Transport has yet to set a date for their resumption with the British Airline Pilots Association, and industry insiders see this as a clear sign ministers plan to ditch the scheme.

"There is no urgency or push on the whole idea," one source said. "Nobody wants it - not the pilots, and not the airlines. The key thing for us is that America had marshals in the air on September 11. The hijackers got through because of lax security on the ground, and that is what we want tackled.

"As far as we are concerned, marshals are just a distraction."

The Transport Department said it did not want to talk about the marshals "for security reasons".

But its apparent cooling towards the idea was revealed as the Government faced calls to break down a wall of secrecy which now surrounds preparations for dealing with the aftermath of a doomsday terror attack. Senior emergency planners say this makes it it hard for them to reassure the public they would be safe in the event of an al Qaeda strike.

There are fears public ignorance could hamper the emergency services in dealing with such an attack. David Kerry, chairman of London's emergency planners, said: "We are making representations to the Government to let more information out.

"If people know what responses would be required in each incident - and what the emergency services will do - they will be much better able to help themselves and the services."