Britain's surveyors have launched a stinging attack on government plans to allow the Financial Services Authority to regulate the general insurance market.

The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors is urging Gordon Brown to "get his tanks of their lawn".

Under plans to implement the European Insurance Mediation Directive, the FSA will take over regulation of the entire insurance market.

But RICS said this would increase red tape and could have an adverse impact.

"We do not consider that there is any significant problem in the UK relating  to  the operation of insurance in the property and construction spheres nor do we feel that the Directive necessitates the kind of 'platinum-plating' that the UK government seems determined to give it," RICS president Nicholas Brooke said in a letter to the chancellor.

"We simply do not understand why  the UK Government has decided to go far beyond what was strictly necessary and apply this directive in ways that other countries do not appear to feel necessary."

The organisation said the move would also increase costs for businesses and consumers, and would be "cumbersome to implement".

Another leading surveyor, Frank Gainsbury, warned that advice on construction-related insurance is "best provided by those who work on a day-to-day business with the organisations involved and who have the appropriate knowledge and training".

"The whole issue as it affects the construction industry is counter-productive," Gainsbury added.

"The very people the regulations are designed to protect will be denied the opportunity to obtain the best possible advice from those in a position to provide it or will have to pay more fees for the advice they get."