Thank you for downloading the 2011 Reith Lectures podcast.

In her second lecture called Security, Eliza Manningham Buller, the former Director-General of MI5, the British Security Service, argues that security and intelligence services operating in a democracy have a good record of protecting and preserving freedom.

Hello and welcome to the second of these wreath lectures on the theme of securing freedom.

We have, of course, been marking the 10th anniversary of 9-11 in recent days,

and our lecturer, Eliza Manning and Buller, the former head of MI5,

has already ruffled a few feathers with her views on the so-called

war on terror that followed that dreadful day. In her first lecture, she revealed the doubt

she had about some aspects of Western policy, notably the invasion of Iraq. This lecture,

entitled Security, promises to be equally pertinent. Some of the issues Lady Manningham

Buller plans to address have been placed firmly on the front pages by the discovery of documents in Libya,

which apparently link US and British intelligence services to Colonel Gaddafi's regime.

We are meeting in the City Museum in Leeds, a fine building in a very fine city,

but you can't have a discussion on this subject in this place

without reflecting that this was home ground for three of the suicide bombers

of Britain's own Black Day, the 7th of July 2005,

when 52 innocent people were killed in London. Ladies and gentlemen, the BBC

Reith Lecturer for 2011, Eliza Manning and Buller.

For 33 years of my life, I was a member of the British Security Service,

popularly known as MI5.

When I joined in 1974, recruitment was a bit haphazard.

I met someone at a party, and with the minimum of effort, found myself somewhat to my surprise in the service. I really had no idea what I was getting into,

but I stayed for over half my life because I enjoyed the work and its challenges.

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