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National Security

My Lords, my noble friend is absolutely right that one of the key issues will be how to ensure that we can recruit effectively for the security services. Recruitment is going on and is being successful, but I take nothing away from the point raised by my noble friend about recruiting not being a simple and straightforward proposition. Secondly, in terms of the communities and understanding better the conditions that can lead people into terrorism—that is indeed the work that the Prevent strategy is undertaking; it is examining areas where we know that young people may be susceptible, who is approaching them and what their role is, how they are being brought into a network, the role of the internet, technology and so on. All of that is important. Finally, it is important that citizens are alert and vigilant without feeling that they are in a state of high alert at all times. The British public are extremely good at doing exactly that.