All of the lessons of the Chilcot report need to be studied in detail before any hard conclusions can be reached about the role of intelligence in our political system.

To rush to hard conclusions about the importance of intelligence to our national security prematurely would be irresponsible.

Having dealt with intelligence material as either a minister or a member of the Intelligence and Security Committee for much of the last 20 years, however, I can offer a few general insights.

First, intelligence is not an exact science: intelligence analysts and the political leaders who have to interpret the material available always need to be careful in assessing what firm conclusions can credibly be drawn from what are often disparate sources.

Second, intelligence is, nevertheless, vital to our national security. As the Heads of the intelligence and security agencies have said, over the recent period seven serious plots have been prevented by information from both human sources (HUMINT) and by signals intelligence (SIGINT).

Third, no country acting alone can have sufficient intelligence capability – whether HUMINT or SIGINT – to know all that we need to know to deal with the threats we face, whether on our streets or at times of international conflict. That is why we have to cooperate with other countries through our closest partners – the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand and, increasingly, with our close neighbours in Europe. The sheer volume of information can be overwhelming and only through rigorous analysis and cooperation with other countries can we make sense of what information is available and what conclusions can be drawn.

Even with rigorous analysis there is no guarantee that the picture that emerges is the whole one or even helpful in making sense of security risks.

It is essential to our national and international security, however, that we have a strong intelligence capacity and reliable intelligence partners who share our democratic and human rights values. Since the invasion of Iraq, the ethical basis on which our UK agencies function has developed enormously, as has the oversight to which they are subjected but it may well be that, following more detailed study of the Chilcot report, further improvements are required.

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George Howarth MP is a member of the Intelligence and Security Committee