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Hello, I'm Helen Katz, and this is today in Parliament for BBC Radio 4 for Tuesday the 18th of November,

where the security minister tells MPs that the government will deal robustly with Chinese spies who

could be hunting for even the tiniest bits of information about them.

China has a low threshold for what information is considered to be of value and will gather

individual pieces of information to build a wider picture.

But a Conservative thinks ministers aren't in any position to negotiate.

You can't reason with a tiger when your head is in its mouth.

Also in this programme, moving on from the troubles, MPs reflect on the impact of conflict.

While legacy remains unresolved, it is like a fog around us in Northern Ireland, shaping the tone of our politics.

And opposition MPs blamed the government for the closure of a chemicals plant in Fife.

MPs and peers opened their inboxes this morning to find a warning from the security services

that they were at significant

risk of being targeted by Chinese spies. The espionage alert was issued by MI5 and had been

circulated by the speakers of both houses of Parliament. It said that the Chinese Ministry of State

Security was actively reaching out to individuals in and around Westminster.

The message also named two accounts on the business networking site LinkedIn that the security

services said were being used as cover identities for Chinese agents. Beijing dismissed the

allegations as pure fabrication and said they were a self-staged charade.

But the security minister Dan Jarvis told the Commons that China was trying to recruit and

cultivate people who had access to sensitive information about Parliament and the government.

...