Britain's top police chief says investigators have foiled 24 terrorist plots since April 2017.

Metropolitan Police Commissioner Cressida Dick today gave the updated figure, which includes 16 Islamist plots and eight inspired by extreme right-wing views.

At the beginning of last month the UK's most senior counter-terrorism officer said the number of foiled terrorist plots since the March 2017 attack by Khalid Masood on Westminster Bridge, in which five people died, including a police officer, had risen from 19 to 22.

Assistant commissioner Neil Basu said that 15 Islamist potential attacks and seven extreme right-wing plots had been stopped.

It suggest police have disrupted two terror plots within the last month, one far right and another Islamist.

The latest figures came amid a government consultation on plans for tougher sentences for terrorist offences.

The UK's national terror threat level is currently 'severe', which means an attack is 'highly likely'

Cressida Dick today gave the updated figure, which includes 16 Islamist plots and eight inspired by extreme right-wing views

The Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre last raised the threat to 'critical' - the highest level, meaning an attack is 'expected imminently' - in September 2017 after the he bombing of a Tube train in Parsons Green in south-west London.

Mr Basu said right-wing extremism is the fastest growing terrorist threat in the UK with about 10% of more than 800 live terror investigations linked to it.

The Government's controversial Prevent programme has seen referrals nearly doubling since 2015/16 to 18%.

He said: 'It's small but it's my fastest-growing problem.'

But Mr Basu said the biggest threat still comes from Islamist and jihadist terrorists.

At the beginning of last month the UK's most senior counter-terrorism officer said the number of foiled terrorist plots since the March 2017 attack by Khalid Masood on Westminster Bridge, (pictured) in which five people died, including a police officer, had risen from 19 to 22

'Despite the increases, right-wing terrorism remains a relatively small percentage of our overall demand, but when nearly a third of the plots foiled by police and security services since 2017 relate to right-wing ideology, it lays bare why we are taking this so seriously,' he said.

'As a proportion of our overall threat it's definitely increasing, whereas the Islamist threat is staying the same, albeit at a very high level.'

Mr Basu said right-wing extremism is the fastest growing terrorist threat in the UK with about 10% of more than 800 live terror investigations linked to it

Mr Basu said counter-terror police and the security services have disrupted right-wing plots 'designed to kill people'.

Methods have mimicked those seen in jihadist plots, including knife attacks and trying to create improvised explosive devices, while some have used Islamic State materials, he told reporters.

Mr Basu said the National Action group has been 'decimated' since it was banned in December 2016, with small groups or individuals now operating across international borders online.

'The lone actor threat is the biggest problem,' he said.

Mr Basu said young people and those with mental health issues are particularly vulnerable to becoming radicalised, with children as young as 14 linked to right-wing terrorism.

He said: 'We are bringing the full might of the UK counter-terrorism machine to bear against those extremists of any ideology who wish to do us harm or incite violence. And that is evident not only in the number of plots we have foiled, but also the number of convictions we have achieved and continue to chase through the courts.'

Also last month official figures revealed that the number of right-wing extremists arrested under anti-terror laws has risen to the highest level on record.

The latest figures came amid a government consultation on plans for tougher sentences for terrorist offences. Pictured is the aftermath of the London Bridge attack in June 2017

The total increased to 33 in the year to the end of June, up from 28 in the previous 12 months, ten in 2016-17 and six in 2015/16.

The rise coincides with another fall in the number of Islamist extremists held by police.

This total peaked in the 12 months to the end of June 2017, when 185 people with Islamist extremist ideologies were arrested on suspicion of a terror-related offence. It dropped to 178 in 2017/18, and 171 in 2018/2019, according to Home Office figures.

There were 266 arrests for suspected terrorism-related activity in the past year, down from 354 in the previous 12 months, continuing a downward trend.

Of those arrested in 2018/19, 23 per cent were released without charge – the lowest percentage since records began after the September 11 terror attacks in 2001.