MI5 recruiting sparks a new wave of patriotic idealism, 3000 applicants within a week

Following on from reports that MI5 is expected to seek more officers, according to the Times Online, idealists rush to join MI5`s army of spies...

The race to recruit hundreds more MI5 officers to wage war on terrorism has been boosted by "a wave of patriotism", according to security chiefs.

Thousands of young people have been flooding to join the agency, turning their backs on higher-paid jobs in their eagerness to defend the country.

The Times has learnt that 3,000 people responded in the first week of MI5’s biggest recruitment drive, which would increase the agency’s manpower to its highest level since the end of the Second World War. MI5 has also been given a 50 per cent rise in its budget, to £300 million a year.

Whitehall officials said it was likely that out of the applicants so far, only 30 to 40 would be suitable to become intelligence analysts or surveillance specialists. Intelligence analysis and surveillance are viewed as two of the areas at the top of MI5’s priorities because of the need to mount covert operations against home-grown Islamic terrorists living in Britain.

Whitehall officials said yesterday that, despite the urgent need to train more people to become surveillance specialists, there was little chance of recruiting more than about 300 extra staff a year over the next three years.

The recruits will receive an initial annual salary of around £20,000. Asked yesterday why so many people had applied, one senior official said: "They seem genuinely to want to do something to help this country, instead of going for a job with a much higher salary. They’re doing it out of idealism." Many applicants will be rejected either because they fail the basic qualifications for entry or because they are perceived to have the wrong idea about what a job in MI5 entails.

Thanks to Du$ty for the alert.

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