Downing Street Says » National Security Strategy

» Wednesday, March 19, 2008

National Security Strategy

Asked what role the Prime Minister envisaged for the National Security Forum and when the new members would be appointed, the PMS replied that we hoped to appoint new members shortly. The role of the National Security Forum, as the Prime Minister said in his statement today, was to advise the recently constituted National Security Committee. At the moment there were a number of experts that were consulted informally by the relevant people in the Cabinet Office and elsewhere, and we wanted to put that onto a more systematic footing.

Asked why we needed a forum as well as a committee, the PMS replied that the committee was comprised of the people who take decisions and were responsible for protecting the public, and included the Prime Minister, Defence Secretary, Foreign Secretary, as well as senior members of the police and the agencies. A forum was the advisory body – they were the experts, but not the people who were accountable or responsible for taking the decisions.

Asked why none of the counter terrorist intelligence units were based in Scotland, the PMS replied that these were operational matters for the police and others. As we said yesterday, there was very close cooperation between the UK government between the devolved administrations on counter-terrorism matters, as we saw in July.

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