Lee Rigby’s life ‘could have been saved’: MI5 needs to up its game

Public have a right to expect MI5 to properly audit procedures and learn from their mistakes quickly

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IF IAN FLEMING were writing the James Bond books today, his hero would be working for MI5, not Universal Exports or MI6, whose role after the long withdrawing roar of British influence in the world, particularly in the last decade, is increasingly one of liaison.

As the front line against Islamist terror has moved from the Middle East to the Midlands and the Home Counties, MI5 has become the key intelligence service.

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is a former Welsh Guards lieutenant colonel and intelligence analyst for the British government's Joint Intelligence Committee. His book, 7-7: What Went Wrong, was one of the first to be published after the London bombings in July 2005.