Whitehall communications chiefs are reported to have used a meeting with Howell James, the head of government information, to criticise Downing Street's attitude to policy making and presentation.

A leaked summary of the discussions shows that the civil servants claimed they were being bullied into making announcements before policy had been properly formulated.

James began the session by saying: "Trust in the government is at the lowest point ever. My nervousness is that the trust problem is just going to be portrayed as a communications problem."

Sian Jarvis, the director of communications at the Department of Health, said: "It's been a hard educational process to explain to my ministers that the reason we are not getting the story across is that we have not got a policy.

"This is the Number 10 problem: they are asking for announcements before we have a policy. The people around Number 10 are fuelling this."