Chilcot Inquiry and Parliamentary Accountability

Debate between Bernard Jenkin and Chris Skidmore

Wednesday 30th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Chris Skidmore]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his separate recommendation and note that the Minister for the Armed Forces is in his place and listening carefully. That is not a new recommendation, but we will consider closely all recommendations from this debate.

Although it is right to learn the lessons identified by the Chilcot report, we should ensure that we avoid learning the wrong lessons. As the then Prime Minister said on the day the report was published,

“it would be wrong to conclude that we should not stand with our American allies when our common…interests are threatened”

and that

“it would be wrong to conclude that we cannot rely on the judgments of our brilliant and hard-working intelligence agencies”.

He said that it is “wrong” to question the capability of our military, who

“remain the envy of the world”.

Perhaps most crucially, he said that it is wrong to

“conclude that intervention is always wrong.”—[Official Report, 6 July 2016; Vol. 612, c. 888.]

This has been a long and exhaustive inquiry. Sir John and his colleagues have had access to thousands of official documents and reached their conclusions—

[Mr Jenkin]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Chris Skidmore]

No, not now.

Lessons are being learned and will continue to be learned from what happened in Iraq, and so the Government can see no merit in undertaking any further inquiries into the Iraq war.