MI5 boss urges Sun readers to join elite spy team and keep Britain safe

BRITAIN’S top spook wants Sun readers to join his elite MI5 team tasked with keeping the nation safe.

Spy chief Ken McCallum says there is no reason why the brightest youngsters from comprehensives and council estates cannot one day lead the Security Service — just like him.

4

4

The 47-year-old, who reveals growing up in a single-parent family inspired him to serve his country, said: “There are still too many people who rule themselves out of careers with MI5 who could be really great.

“What really matters here in this place is teamwork. We are absolutely not about James Bond stereotypes.

“If there’s a little bit in my story that helps others think, ‘I’m not that different to him’, and so can see themselves being in MI5 then that’s great.”

In the most open interview ever given by a serving spymaster, Mr McCallum tells how he helped care for his younger brother while still at school, and of the moment he told his two kids who he really was.

'I hadn’t got a clue what I wanted to do with my life but I knew I wanted to contribute something. I wanted to serve'

Ken McCallum

He was appointed last April after a stellar 25-year career targeting terrorism in Northern Ireland, smashing al-Qaeda plots, and heading up cases such as the Salisbury poisonings.

But his life began in a “regular” suburb of Glasgow. His parents split when he was three — leaving his mum to run the family while working as a teacher of children with learning difficulties.

It made an impact on young Ken.

He recalled: “I hadn’t got a clue what I wanted to do with my life but I knew I wanted to contribute something. I wanted to serve.”

The Partick Thistle fan excelled at his state school, but had to help support his mum at home even after she remarried when he was a teenager.

He was particularly good at maths. One teacher rang his mum, quietly urging her to encourage her son to apply to Oxford or Cambridge.

Yet, like so many kids from similar backgrounds, he felt it was just a step too far.

Speaking to The Sun at MI5’s Thames House HQ in central London, he said: “I had not often left Scotland and the expense of relocating meant it didn’t seem like a realistic option.

“Plus, I was trying to help out at home.”

Instead he went on to university in his home city, studying maths and computing. He thought about a career as a lecturer before applying to the civil service “out of curiosity”.

A letter came back, asking if he would be interested in the “intelligence services” — and Mr McCallum joined MI5 in 1995.

He cut his teeth as an intelligence officer and agent-runner in Northern Ireland.

After helping to run the office of then MI5 boss Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller, he began heading up a large team tackling the al-Qaeda threat in 2008.

By 2012, he had been put in charge of all counter-terrorism probes in the run-up to the London Olympics.

In 2015 he was named a Deputy Director General, later running all of the service’s operations — including dealing with the Russian plot to poison ex-double agent Sergei Skripal.

Mr McCallum stepped out of the shadows to become the 18th Director General of MI5 last year, taking over from Sir Andrew Parker.

Among all the responsibilities, he had to tell his children he was a spy.

Without revealing his cover story, he said: “They were very good. This career, it takes their dad away a lot. It has eaten into family Christmases, for example. But they understand the importance of what we do and know how much it matters to me. We all get used to managing our lives in a particular way.”

Despite the difficulties, Mr McCallum says it is vital for his spies to have “families to go home to” and a “balance in their lives”.

He paid tribute to “three or four bosses, most of them women” who had “widened my horizons”.

One was Dame Eliza, who set him on the road to succeed her.

But Mr McCallum also hailed another colleague who told him MI5 was all about “partnerships and alliances”, not rivalries.

He added: “Everything we do is about partnerships — with the police, MI6, GCHQ or internationally with countries like America.”

Mr McCallum concedes life as a spook can be bleak, with threats seemingly around every corner.

He added: “I think in our line of work there is sometimes a temptation to think, ‘Does the world get any better? Or is it just getting worse?’

Mr McCallum revealed MI5 uses top film directors and actors to help train spies

“But there are areas, like Northern Ireland for example, where there has been, on balance, a successful peace process.

“We played our part in choking off the violence enough to help that take place and that’s something to be rightly proud of. We don’t always succeed, but we often do.”

He cites the role MI5 played in smashing the 2006 jet bombs plot as one of its greatest achievements, saying: “If that had happened, it would have ended in a global shock on the level of 9/11.”

And Mr McCallum revealed MI5 uses top film directors and actors to help train spies, explaining: “We try to pull in external voices when we can. It’s a really important part of our organisation.

“We do a very specialised form of acting here, it’s an important part of our skillset. Actors have to perform, just like that.

READ MORE SUN STORIES

CASH IN

Thousands have 10 DAYS left to apply for benefit to unlock winter fuel payment

DECK THE HALLS

I've spent £2k on my Christmas decs for my council house - they're so classy

“And in our work we have to nail it, in that moment, when it really, really matters. It’s no good getting it right in a meeting room, hours later. It has to be then.”

So what is he looking for in recruits? Deep commitment, curiosity and, most vitally, “people from different parts of the country, with a range of different skills, voices, experiences”.

4

4