'New powers for police and MI5' after London and Manchester attacks

THE POLICE and MI5 ware set to be handed new powers which will enable them to stop terror attacks at an earlier stage, according to reports.

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Mourners gather at the Manchester Arena

In a bid to protect the public, officers will reportedly be able to swoop in and fast-track terror suspects to justice before attack plans are finalised.

Documents leaked to The Sunday Times reveal security services will be able to disrupt terror plots at at earlier stage after atrocities in Manchester, at London Bridge and Westminster claimed the lives of 35 people last year.

Of the five extremists involved in the attacks, three of them were among a whopping 23,000 on the radar of security services.

The plan in a 120-page draft of the Government’s counterterrorism strategy calls for more focus on “communities where the threat from terrorism and radicalisation is highest”.

Authorities have come under fire for targeting young Muslims at risk of extremism through the Prevent strategy, but the new approach will result in "more than double the number" of young radicals over the next year.

The bill also demands Home Secretary Amber Rudd let spies warn government departments about jihadis before being deemed dangerous enough to warrant MI5 to step in, introduce longer prison sentences for convicted extremists, beef up security at concerts like Ariana Grande’s gig that was last May hijacked by a suicide bomber who killed 23.

It also instructs Ms Rudd to improve the detection of chemical, biological and radiological agents in the wake of the Salisbury novichok attempted murder of Sergei Skripal, 66, and 33-year-old daughter Yulia, found slumped on a park bench after the poison was smeared on Mr Skripal’s front door handle.

Disturbingly, the paper warns ISIS “still represents the most significant” threat as well as al-Qaeda, the IRA and far-right extremists.

The paper also vowed: “We will disrupt terrorist threats in the UK earlier to take account of the scale of the threat and the speed at which plots are now developing.”

MI5 were blasted for misinterpreting two pieces of “highly relevant” intelligence about Manchester Arena suicide bomber Salman Abedi before he struck.

According to the paper, Westminster attacker Khalid Masood, who murdered five people, was a “peripheral figure” in a 2010 MI5 investigation.

Only Khuram Butt, one of three London Bridge killers who mowed down eight people in the capital, had been under investigation by MI5 at the timer.

Shockingly, he escaped - despite being featured in Channel 4 documentary The Jihadis Next Door.