05:54

The government is not planning to increase the threat level to “critical” in the aftermath of the Manchester attack.

The threat level has been at “severe”, the fourth highest ranking, since 2014. Moving it on to the fifth and highest level would only be done if the police and intelligence services feared another attack was imminent.

MI5, which has a regional office in the north-west of England, has been been working through the night with police.

Much of the focus of the investigation is on where the attacker, who was killed in the attack, obtained the ingredients for making a bomb. Details of how to make a bomb can be found on the internet, but a degree of training is usually needed to succeed in detonating it.

With the amount of CCTV footage available, the police could have been able to quickly establish the identity of the attacker.