Britain needs a US-style national security adviser to report
to Prime Minister Gordon Brown on terrorist threats, a
committee of lawmakers said in a report that made unusually
sharp criticisms of the country's approach to security.
Parliament's Home Affairs select committee said Britain's
government had been too slow to adapt to an evolving threat
from terrorism and complained that key strategic decisions
are often made in informal meetings, rather than by a
publicly accountable security panel.
The committee, led by governing Labour Party lawmaker Keith
Vaz - a former minister - urged Brown to overturn a ban on
the use of intercepted evidence and called for a house
arrest-type regime used against some terrorism suspects to be
abandoned.
It criticsed how Britain's counterterrorism apparatus is
structured, saying a confusing number of government
committees and departments are responsible for making
decisions - often with little public oversight.
The committee had the "impression that a degree of
institutional inertia has set in," inside the government, the
report said.
"We are not confident that government institutions have the
desire to constantly adapt to meet ever-changing threats,"
the committee said.
In 2005, Britain experienced a major terrorism attack in
London when four suicide bombers killed 52 commuters on three
subway trains and a bus; an almost identical attack two weeks
later failed.
In June 2007, terrorists left two explosives-laden cars in
the heart of London's entertainment district but they failed
to detonate, and the same group crashed a blazing sport
utility vehicle into Glasgow Airport.
In its report, Vaz's committee said "prominent, publicly
accountable national security advisers must be appointed," to
provide Brown with expert advice and be available to explain
threats to legislators.
In 2007, Brown appointed Alan West, a former head of military
intelligence, as a House of Lords member and his government's
security minister.
However, Vaz's panel said that experts who are not
legislators, like President Barack Obama's security adviser
Gen Jim Jones, should also be appointed.
The panel complained key security strategy was being set at
an informal weekly meeting of ministers, intelligence service
officials and police - and called for a formal national
security committee to be established.
In its report, the committee said it had until recently been
unaware of the weekly security meeting.
"The lack of public awareness of its existence is troubling,"
the lawmakers said. "The public have a right to know who is
protecting them from terrorist threats and in turn, those
protecting the public should expect to be accountable."
Britain's system of control orders, a system of curfews used
to curtail the movements of terror suspects who can't be
brought to trial without revealing sensitive intelligence,
was no longer appropriate, the committee said.
"It is fundamentally wrong to deprive individuals of their
liberty without revealing why," the panel's report added.
The committee recommended that intercept evidence should be
permitted in British courts, which would allow more of those
held under control orders to be prosecuted.
Britain is one of the few countries in the world to bar the
use of evidence from intercepted personal phone calls,
e-mails, letters and faxes.
Intelligence agencies have resisted attempts to allow such
evidence, fearing it would expose their surveillance
techniques to public scrutiny.
Home Secretary Alan Johnson said the committee's criticisms
were "unsubstantiated and wholly inaccurate", insisting
Britain's government had the correct approach to security
risks.
