Every phone call, text message, email and website visit made by Britons is to be stored for a year and will be available for monitoring by government bodies.

All telecoms companies and internet service providers will be required by British law to keep a record of every customer's personal communications, showing who they have contacted, when and where, as well as the websites they have visited.

Despite public opposition, 653 public bodies will have access to the data, including police, local councils, the ambulance service, fire authorities and even prison governors.

They will not require the permission of a judge or a magistrate to obtain the information, but simply the authorisation of a senior police officer or the equivalent of a deputy head of department at a local authority.

Ministers had originally wanted to store the information on a single government-run database, but chose not to because of privacy concerns. But the Government announced this week that it was pressing ahead with privately held ''Big Brother'' databases that opposition leaders said amounted to state spying on the public.

It is doing so despite its own research showing that it has little public support.

The law will increase the amount of personal data that can be obtained by officials through the controversial Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, which is supposed to be used for fighting terrorism.

Although most private firms already hold details of private calls and emails for their own business purposes, most do so only on an ad hoc basis for a period of several months.

The new rules will not only force communications companies to keep their records longer, but also to expand the data they keep to include details of every website their customers visit.

While public authorities will not be able to view the contents of emails or phone calls, they will be able to see the internet addresses, dates and times and identify recipients of calls.

Firms involved in storing the data will be reimbursed at a cost to the taxpayer of £2 billion ($3.6 billion) over 10 years.

Chris Grayling, the shadow home secretary, said: ''The big danger in all of this is 'mission creep'. This Government keeps on introducing new powers to tackle terrorism and organised crime which end up being used for completely different purposes. We have to stop that from happening''.

Chris Huhne, the Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, has criticised the amount the scheme will cost for what he said is in effect ''state spying''.

''It is simply not that easy to separate the bare details of a call from its content,'' he said. ''What if a leading business person is ringing Alcoholics Anonymous?''

The proposed law will not come before Parliament until after the general election. But the Home Office insisted it would push it through.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/8350660.stm