Internet users can pose their questions directly to Mr Brown by posting a video message on the Ask The PM site.

And he has promised to answer the most popular queries regularly with his own video messages - the first of which appears at www.youtube.com/downingst.

Describing the move as an "exciting new initiative", Mr Brown said: "I will be here to answer your questions about how globalisation is working; what's happening to climate change; how we can build the houses we need; how we can get the jobs we need for the future; how we can do better with the health service; how we can do better with all the different public services the Government provides.

"I am here to answer your questions. Politicians get the chance in Prime Minister's Questions. I think it is time the public had a chance."

The deadline for the first set of questions is June 21, and Mr Brown promised to be back "at some point soon" to deliver his answers.

The site follows the creation of the Webcameron site by Conservative leader David Cameron, who once branded Mr Brown "an analogue Prime Minister in a digital age".

By Monday morning Ask The PM had already attracted almost 3,500 subscribers.