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Ex-MI6 chief: Brexit means more spending to retain UK influence

The UK's former spy chief has suggested Britain might not actually quit the EU - and warned greater spending on diplomacy, defence and intelligence will be needed if Brexit does go ahead.

Sir John Sawers, who oversaw MI6 as spymaster "C" between 2009 and 2014, claimed the "default outcome" of Brexit is that the UK is "poorer and weaker" and will diminish the country's role in the world.

The ex-civil servant also compared leaving the EU to the UK's situation in the 1970s, a period when Britain was dubbed "the sick man of Europe".

Speaking to the House of Lords' EU external affairs sub-committee, Sir John even cast doubt on whether Brexit will proceed.

He told peers that "Brexit - assuming it goes ahead - will have an impact" on the UK's participation in co-ordinated foreign policy action against countries such as Russia, Iran or North Korea and terror groups such as Islamic State.

Calling for more funding for security services once outside the EU, Sir John said: "It will be vital that we sustain, in many ways enhance, our investments in diplomacy, defence, intelligence - very high investments are made already - if we want to have an influence in the world of the sort we have had over the last 30 or 40 years."

But Sir John, now chairman of consultancy firm Macro Advisory Partners, acknowledged the Government might be able to negotiate a Brexit deal to avoid economic harm.

"We would have to take specific actions through the negotiations and over the years following Brexit in order to recover that position and demonstrate a new dynamism," he said.

Comparing the situation to the 1970s, Sir John added: "We managed to turn that round through the '80s, '90s and 2000s - it is possible to do that but it will be a major challenge, a national challenge."

Responding to Sir John's comments, UKIP's security and terrorism spokesman Richard Bingley said: "I agree with Sir John in that UK national security spending needs to significantly rise. But this is not because of Brexit.

"It is because successive UK Governments have cut the police and armed forces to record low numbers, failed to control our borders, failed to jail thousands of extremists, failed to withdraw from European Court of Human Rights and failed to deter and degrade Islamic State and al Qaeda terrorism at our front door."