HBG

I really can't understand why a Conservative led government should expose all of our three intelligence services to public scrutiny at this time. Is it transparency or lunacy?

Despite a lot of bleeping that is bound to take place (there's a two minute delay) we will be giving away our secrets to the enemy. We might well become a laughing stock in the eyes of the big ones, the US, China and Russia.

Or are we that insignificant it doesn't matter?

Domino

our intelligence services are supposed to be secret, kept from the likes of you, I and the enemy whoever that may be. Those "in the know" should be kept to a minimum and there should be no hand wringing and apologies.
And that's why I had to sign the Official Secrets Act Twice.

We need more transparency in salaries and employment contracts in private companies rather than in our secret services.

Dick Dasterdly

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't believe they are meeting to discuss any sensitive information which may be of some use to foreign powers or potential enemies, but rather to discuss the rights and wrongs of the way they are allowed to go about their business.

Domino

then why did you say.......

the US is always doing this hand wringing, trying to find out who did what where and when and who gave them permission to do it and why was so much money spent on it.

IMHO madness.
You can't expect to find out what an enemy - potential or existing (does the UK really have any of the latter?) is doing without some form of intelligence.
But you also can't expect it to become common knowledge as to how "they" go about it.

HBG

I too have signed it at least twice.

I've always thought the public (me included) have felt safe in the knowledge that our secret service is protecting us from our evil enemies and have never cared too much just how they did it.

Our leaders, of whatever political colour, have always answered any searching questions with the phrase, 'We don't comment on our security services,' which I thought eminently sensible.

Why this change of heart?

HBG

I watched the show for an hour and a half this afternoon, and a jolly good show it was by all the performers, questioners and questioned alike.

My award for telling the most lies went to the bloke from GCHQ, but he had the decency to blush a couple of times.

The award for the most boring buffoon went to Lord Butler, who asked questions about a report he himself wrote in 2002.

The only revelation of the most serious home grown terrorism threat was the admission that it came from Syria, from the Al Queda rebels. Didn't William Hague want to supply them with arms a few months ago?

He didn't even need to send the arms to Syria, Bradford would have sufficed.

Domino

ISTR it isn't actually the Govt that supplies the arms, they just issue an export licence to arms dealers who then supply to "friendly" countries.
But then those licences seem to bear no relationship to the "Safe Country" list that is used to define if an Asylum Seeker has a valid reason for requesting Asylum.