so, you know, we're in a challenging situation at the moment. as you all know there is a lot of work going on at the u.n. in this regard. so, you know, this is an ongoing story. >> i'm afraid our time is elapsed. you will be directed to at reception in the adjacent room. i like to thank all of you for attending today and for those watching today's proceedings on c-span. join me in thanking ambassador daniel benjamin for an excellent presentation. [applause] . .

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home equity, and making loans to the against it, there was a natural risk of abuse. >> sunday, michael lewis on the subprime mortgage crisis, his latest is "the big short." he is also the author of liar's poker, the new new thing. and the blindside, which was the basis for the movie starring sandra bullock. michael lewis at 8 p.m. asian and pacific on c-span's q&a. >> all this month see the winners of the c-span student cam video of documentary competition.

>> next the british defense and home secretaries testify before the newly established joint committee on national security strategy. the committee was established to help monitor th develop an of national security strategy, which was published in marc march 2008. this two-hour session covers terrorism, organized crime, and natural disasters. >> order, order. this is the first public meeting of the joint committee on the national security. since the committee's creation nearly two years ago when the first strategy was published but it has taken of all time to get established and we are very pleased, finally, to be in operation and to welcome our first group of witnesses. who we very much welcome. i am conscious of the home secretary is in the chamber answer questions and will be with us very shortly.

i think as everyone will be conscious, dissolution is likely to cut short our work in the near term, but we hope it will be taken up again in the new parliament by his successor committee. can i now welcome, in particular the defense secretary lord west, and mr. bright. and as i said home secretary very shortly. i know that some questions, something of a question if i could put it like that have been circulated in outline, and could i say also to all the witnesses right at the beginning, that we hope that this whole session will be able to be in public. but if we get into territory where someone feels that they would like to expand, but do so in private, i will suspend the committee and we will go into a short private session at the end. not at the point when it comes up. so i hope that's quite clear. i also feel we have to start on

perhaps a slightly less than happy note. i think many people in the room will be aware today, we've had announced published by way of written statement the report on progress on the national security strategy, along with contest and report, an updated national risk register, and a number of other documents which is fine. but except the committee had been given no notice that any of these documents were to be published today. and naturally we are quite concerned, dismayed, that that should have happened. i should perhaps put on record that i have had a telephone call of apology from the relevant high authorities, but nevertheless, i think the committee is quite, doesn't feel this is a very good president. in particular if i could add it would have been more cursors as well as more efficient for us to have been given notice. but it will have been much more

useful for us about the document a few days ahead so that people have a chance to look at them, and sort them so they can inform the question. in the brief hour or so that we have had them, that would have informed our questions. so if i can place that on record, i don't know whether any of our witnesses feel as moved to comment today anyway? >> could i apologize for this? it is an air. it is not quick. it would've been much but if you had it in advance and i apologize for that. i think we will be writing to explain the situation to be quite honest is not the right way of doing things and i accept that. and i should ensure that that doesn't happen. i do apologize to the committee for its. >> thank you very much. to be quite honest, lord was, obviously largest made with being our first session. what matters much more to us in the last time this happens. and not that it is the first time. can't i just begin by asking

about the definition of national security that is given in the national security strategy? is an interesting definition. is itself already to be standing the test of time? >> i think the position on the definition was, i was very keen not to spend days and days trying to refine and define what exactly this definition should be. and so we sort of provided more vision really, which was to protect the united kingdom and its interest in order to enable its people to go back their lives freely with conference. this was quite a change of a we looked at this issue before. we haven't had a national security strategy in this country ever. i think it was something missing that we needed your i think we needed it for a long time. certainly since the last war to be quite useful at various times. but it was quite clear to the

prime minister when he became prime minister, because i had a discussion with them, that we need to move forward to produce a national security strategy. but because of all the change in the differences between the cold war days and now, and the various different sort of threats that we should look at this any differently. and we should basically on threats to our citizens whether in this country or abroad. and that is how we arrived at that sort of vision. now, the danger with a was of course it could encompass just about every single thing there was as a threat. so we've set a threshold. so serious organized crime for example, was seen as a real risk and if it. to citizens of our country. whereas some minor crime wouldn't be and would mean eight counterspy by this particular strategy. and also that definition allowed us to look at the need for government and looking after governments capabilities to protect its people as well. we felt that vision did meet the criteria. we have had talks that security

and the definition of security since then, and as i thought, it is up with meetings that go on for about five hours with people coming to a proper conclusion of the. it isn't very interesting point in terms of defense or security. and i think it's a but we might have to look at further. but as far as a national security strategy goes i think matt is quite appropriate. and has enabled us to do quite a lot. >> i asked you if it was me the test of time. i'm also slightly interested in how it is evolving. when you make in serious organized crime, and i see a report published today that there is an indication that a new ministerial subcommittee has been set up, specifically to focus on the. is that because of the capitalist south? >> that's right. what the national security -- first of all in answer to question, yes, it has withstood the test of time. with the national security strategy has done is thrown off lots of areas where we have had to develop our work and look at things. there's no doubt that the

organized serious organized crime which was meeting later this week is one of the things that is popped out of this as we look in detail added. it's one of the things have come out. covetous cybersecurity strategy came out of this because we look at domains and threatened debate for the nation, rather like the work on space security, space on maritime security. all of those areas have been scorned by this national security strategy. and looking at it in the way we looked. of course, it ranges from state on state which are the classic once we look at. when the secretary of state defense look at those areas but this was goes through his things like fragile states, all of those things that the biggest threat we have to our nation, which is terrorism at the moment, and that's terrorism led by al qaeda, but also the al qaeda inspite terrorism that we see. and then down to serious organized crime. and it allows us to run right

down to things like which report, things with flooding, civil contingency, is national resilient, the whole issue of energy security. and it's enabled us to encompass all those. and these have spawned a mass of work and a lot of things that we may be the focus on and identify gaps where we think we're doing things. >> thank you. could i just, raise something with you that came out in a briefing that the committee had at our first meeting, which is the issue of existing legislation. because of course existing legislation focus on what i might call the old definition of national security exclusively. and an indication was given to us that it was about to any need to revisit or to revise such legislation. does that remain to do or is that something else that's being kept under review? >> well, i think as a number of errors, we keep it under review. at the moment it appears we don't need any specific new

legislation as far as i'm aware. >> okay. and on -- >> cannot just throw an example? if one goes to say cybersecurity for example, which is a huge area which i'm sure you will want to ask more about, but within that domain there are ethical and legal issues. about usage of exactly how this is done. now that might into coarse that work is evil by the ses sponsor that were there some needs to actually do something. >> yes, good point. i take that point. and you talked about some of the differences from the publication of a national security strategy. but one of the things i do quite like to engage the secretary of state of defense on its there's a reference about the use of the armed forces been included in the strategy and so on. has that make a difference do you feel to the approach to the way the armed forces approach these issues? >> i think it's made a very

useful contribution to the way that we do things, whether or not it is a strategic level. for instance, the recent developer of the green paper. for which the national secret a strategy was extremely useful, so all of the threat assessment, the green paper could be developed within the context of the national security strategy. right names in individual areas like cybersecurity and you know the potential for cyber attacks. the last thing we want is m.o.d. who have been doing assessments of threats in this area for a very long time there to be developing, you know, capability and analysis separate to, you know, a joined up in a way of approaching. so the very fact that we can now do that and we do that in a completely, you know, work

together with other government departments is i think a step in the right direction. and what people would expect us to be doing. >> thank you. and welcome home, secretary. i am pleased that you could do it. i'm going to move on now. >> lord bless, use it to explore what's not in the strategy and how things get in and out of the strategy. use that action had been spawned, by the strategy on for example, cyber threats and maritime, it wasn't ask the a strategy that spawned bigamous events that spawned. things happen and we had to respond to them. so the list is already got longer. i mean the report today has a got a lot more things to do anything any event, it happens that represents a threat to presumed to be adequate so that

the danger of this kind of exercise is it is so wide that it doesn't really exist. and anything gets added to it, if an important event comes along. if people are kidnapped by some other kind of extremist somewhere else then we will have, you know, they will be added on. and it was links in a little bit to a question i was going to export later about your risk announces. is this really a way in which really selects things that are national security, or is it going to respond to? >> i think there are two parts. clearly governments respond to events clearly. but not always are they going to be encompassed as part of the national security strategy. >> if you are a serious threat, maritime pirates come along and they are anything and it causes a problem and we have to respond to it than there any strategy by definition. >> if it is a serious threat than yes, clearly it would.

if there is a series that we haven't identified, which we haven't seen it yet. for example, let's look at counterterrorism. within counterterrorism, and madam secretary talked more, for example, if you break out the contest strategy with a four piece you find their stuff like which is produced the cbr in strategy. for the first time ever in your in the world in terms of counterterrorist aspect. the science and technology strategy looking at how we use science and technology in academia things to tackle some of those issues. so a whole raft of those things are broken out. in terms of cyber, yes one was aware, when i came into two half years ago i was in contact with the captain talk about cyber. but in the context of the national security strategy and looking at the domain, this was a clear domain what action and threat action is taken against the nation. quite clearly we need to have a strategy that tackled it within that domain. in the same way as the maritime

domain was and the same way as space was another domain. i think was quite a good way of identifying those, and i don't believe we need to knee-jerk each little incident, although very often the government does have to react to what one might call a small incident. so for example, the chancellor are very worrying and afford office, very close to engage with trying to get them released. but that specific instant wouldn't necessarily say that we have to have a complete strategy on smaller boats in the indian ocean or something. piracy, yes. we've already identified that. this is a subset of that. >> will things get knocked out of his strategy? the danger is as events go roaming on it gets bigger and bigger and bigger. there's practically nothing that somewhere in the recesses, should be people be aware? there are limited amount of resources. >> there are limited resources. i don't see exactly the same

danger that i can understand what you're saying but i don't think that danger is as great as you are articulating. and i think we can keep it constrained but i do understand where you're coming from. >> bit won't be any good saying to someone who comes with another crisis breaks out and you say, i'm sorry that's not in the strategy. if the public says it's a crisis it will be a crisis. >> i agree and i like to think we will have identified within this these things will pop up and would fit immediately into one of the areas we looked at. one can't be complacent. maybe there isn't something we haven't spotted. i think we have. >> before we move on, that's an argument that. >> just a short point. to the defense secretary if i make him he responded to the question the chairman asked about the will of the ministry of defense in relation to the national security strategy, i think what there's a particular interest is a doctor at the moment refers to not so much the

use of the armed forces which is as must be root in the national security strategy framework. and my question is, in what way do you feel the use of the armed forces may be different in future compared to what it might have been but for the existence of a national security strategy? >> well, the whole of what we do and defense is connected with security. that's what it's about at the end of the day. so having the ability at home to provide the necessary backup to the police service as they would require of some threat might arise. right through to what we do, and how we do what we do, and why we are doing in afghanistan with 9000 troops is all to do with our national security at the end of the day. and has to be linked in to what other departments are doing. and one has to continue to see our operations in that light.

one would want us not to be in a pretty mindful of how what happens abroad can impact on what happens at home, and vice versa. and our armed forces have to be and are thoroughly aware, you know, of that dimension of foreign activities, whether it is dealing with piracy on the high seas or whether or not it's dealing with the taliban in afghanistan. >> briefly on that. you are not, correct me if i'm wrong that the use of the armed forces which is for ministers to decide whether the armed forces themselves you're not suggesting that the government is contemplating a wider use of our armed forces than is traditionally been the case in the past, or are you? >> look, i mean, i think the strategy has been, you know, particularly useful in enabling people to understand exactly how the different elements of our security fit together. it's very important, you know,

for every to do with homeland security to know exactly what defense, you know, can provide for what duration and what timescales. when they are planning the size and shape of their own capability. and that's where the strategy is particularly useful. >> thank you. >> sorry to talk to much, but the third question, that day which i think the committee wanted to export was a favorable one, with assessment and management, very, very important and very good that it is at the heart of the strategy. but it is very, very difficult to resist pressures of anxiety. for example, the risk assessment by the department of health when swine flu was wrong. and it was done quite properly and so on and so forth but it was actually wrong. and we probably spent too much by that was unnecessarily spent

as a result. it was wrong for all the right reasons for so one and so forth. but how'd do you actually say no to something which is causing really, really profound anxiety? the most famous example of these usually around things like a far greater spend per se getting any of the agency. but you have to spend more because people are more anxious about it. so you have to respond to the public. so that in the end you are risking -- risk assessment which were statisticians will produce for you, i don't mean you, i mean us. tends to go out the window when public anxiety comes along. and you then have the other very complicated aspect which is how do you bounce a very big risk, which is very remote? which anyway you can't do anything about. against a much lesser risk which is much more probable than you have people telling you should put me right strikes it if

you're not careful. >> i think you identify, you identify. i think first of all i would say i disagree with you on the pandemic. the pentium. i think what is are interesting, what is are interesting with that is that we produce our first national register. again this is the first time this has been done. in 2018 every year we can produce produced the nra which was classified and what we want to do was let out to the local resilience and the reach of resilience for a than to understand what the risks work as we identify them as hell out of the national security strategy so they could see what are the things that risk to us locally. we had a big debate. should we put in graph format what is the most likely, would have the greatest impact and try to do that? you immediately become sort of aren't savvy. i said we jolly well are going to try to do that we will try to do that and isaac highest risk identified and that was the flu pandemic. and, therefore, people made preparations for the.

those preparations paid off. we learn more less but we did that well in terms of handling that pandemic. and we were very, very likely that actually it wasn't of a more virulent type. it could easily have been an avian flu type, one of the ones we saw is the really dangerous. and then thank goodness if we had i think we reacted very well. i think we can strengthen. one could argue was as bad as people might have thought but i think we deserve a huge take for that actually. i think was a great success and we would should be very pleased for the. and it was identified as a high priority. i don't think i have gotten the right strike that there are some things which are much more remote but quite catastrophic impacts which are much further down the excesses. but we have tried to identify the and for the first time ever as i say, we have given some sort of risk assessment and we have let the public be aware of this because it's unclassified and exact the same way we fought so hard to and content strategy and classified so people can see.

the same way we've always almost every publication to try to and sometimes it's been actually difficult to do that so they can see the working so they can tackle these issues and the local resilience can sit down with local money or whatever and look at what the priority should be and take some action. and i believe we have tried to tackle this. that is absolutely right which is produced another than the second one has, this week? is it right? i would not be complacent, i don't think it is. i think more work will need to be done. we do are rising skancke mystically. we do horizon scanning looking at foreign policy and external issues, and do we draw on that to try to do these risk assessors. i think we're done quite well if you look at the graph reproduced first i look at this, it's not too bad. >> just one quick follow-up. i won't argue. the problem is when people's anxieties are concerned, your cat just to get swept away.

there's as much chance of a nuclear explosion from a civil nuclear power station as there in from chewing chewing gum which is more or less true. you still have to spend a great deal more on new core safety than you do on road safety. death. so that in the end, i'm just a little anxious that you still have to respond to what the public wants on these. whatever you work out. >> i mean, i agree absolutely the perception is usually important. let's take new clue safety for example. i did a very close look at nuclear safety and i was not content. i'm not happy that it was. you should have to spend money. you are right. that balance of resources can be quite tricky debate sometimes. i agree. but we've identified, we've identified risks. we look to them in detail. and what we're able to do with his national security strategy is tally things across. we're able to relate

counterterrorism to serious organized crime. were working to see if they relate. we're able to pull other factors together. somebody resilience, and i think that has been very helpful coming out of this but as i say we haven't got a perfect answer. but it's very interesting that an awful lot of other causes are looking at the way we are doing does and seem to have been taken by. >> on the lessons of the flu pandemic, you talk about resilience. why is it then for example, you haven't learned one lesson of the flu pandemic. it's much more exposed to the risk of pandemic and more diverse. network structure of funds. >> you commie flat back and i'm afraid i can't answer that. i mean, i know that we've been getting lessons learned from it the whole time. and i don't know the answer to the. i would have to get back to in writing. >> if you could let us know.

lord fellowes, did you want to follow up? >> please. this follows nicely from the last exchange. perhaps i will ask home secretary if he is happy with the public engagement with the national study strategy. at the moment seems to me that it is minimal. there's already making things available but you somehow have to catch the public's attention. and it is not restricted really to the public's change or being told for them not to leave the bags unattended at an airport. i just wonder whether a little more frankness with the public would lead to more of the open channel between public and government as to the strategy. >> this is something i do think about since we put the threat level up to severe. in light of the detroit incident at christmas. you all know the history of the.

the history of this was the security are was always something internally for the security forces and people for the please who guard our system. it was never made public. there was a big push to say the public have a right to know what the security alert is, and in response to that we agreed to make the security alert public. i would be nervous if the question is should we go a step further to and actually say why we have come to the conclusion, or even give some kind of outline reasons as to why we have come to that conclusion. in the interest of public engagement of our security strategy. all i know is that we were desperately worried that any conjecture about why we have done that could have damaged our ability to going into intelligence information. there were about seven different theories running in the next sunday papers, otherar