THE scaling of a building above Whitehall and Downing Street by Batman, Robin, and Captain America was timed to coincide with the Government's announcements on family friendly working.

There is no suggestion that it was timed to coincide with Home Secretary Charles Clarke's desperate fight to get the Government's anti-terror legislation through the Commons - but the irony is there for all to see.

We have been left in no doubt that the terror threat against Britain is very real. So real that the Government is adamant that urgent new powers are required to protect the country from attack, even if those powers erode long-established principles of justice.

Only yesterday, Tony Blair told BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour that "several hundred" terrorists were planning attacks in the UK.

And yet, protestors dressed as superheroes are able to clamber up onto vantage points - Whitehall, Buckingham Palace or the Tyne Bridge during the Labour Party Spring Conference - and make their point.

Although they are starting to wear a bit thin, there is a funny side to their stunts: they present unmissable photo-opportunities, and are therefore guaranteed to generate huge publicity.

But there is also a very serious side to it all because the Fathers4Justice campaigners are exposing Britain's security arrangements as a dangerous joke.

If Batman, Robin, and Captain America can get so close to the Government or the Royal Family, imagine what terrorists intent on devastation might do.