Chilcot Inquiry

Lord Dykes Excerpts

Thursday 22nd October 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dykes (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris, for launching this debate and raising some of the very searching questions that he did, quite rightly. On 1 July at Question Time he referred to these matters and suggested that there should be some kind of interim publication.

None of us can be other than extremely sympathetic to the role that the hapless—I use the word deliberately—Sir John Chilcot has had to undertake in this inquiry. He is regarded as a person of great integrity, probity and distinction in his field. In many ways, there could not have been a better choice. But I was very struck on 4 February when the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Commons, chaired by Richard Ottaway, had its hearing with him. The then right honourable Sir Menzies Campbell—now the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Pittenweem—asked,

“do you ever rue the day that you were asked to take on this responsibility, Sir John?”.

Sir John Chilcot said:

“I try very hard not to rue the day”.

He went on to say:

“May I put it this way, Sir Ming? All of us, and I say this in seriousness, are determined to get this thing done. None of us thought it would take this long. We want to get it done, but we are not going to get it done by scamping the work or failing in the essential principles that we have set ourselves: everything we say and conclude must be based on evidence. It’s got to be fair; it’s got to be impartial; it’s got to be rigorous—all of that”.

That must therefore be the background once again to the putative timetable for the eventual publication—I very much agree with the analysis of the noble Lord, Lord Butler, on these matters—of the substance of what happened in those terrible events in 2003: the declaration of a war that was illegal, only certificated by the UN under pressure afterwards; the worst possible post-war Foreign Office decision apart from Suez for the United Kingdom; the mistakes that were made.

In the debate which I raised in July 2014, which I think was probably the last substantial debate on this matter in this House apart from exchanges at Question Time, I was very struck by the contribution of a non- politician and a non-lawyer, the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley of Knighton, who is not here today. He said this of the commemorations of the First World War and all that:

“That is germane to what we are talking about because we owe it to the many people who gave their lives so bravely and to the many families that lost relatives to always look with microscopic attention at the reasons for going to war. We know now that many mistakes were made and we really should be trying to use the example of those errors to never make them again. That is why this inquiry is so terribly important. Then we have the families of those representing us who were bereaved in Iraq and—because of our actions there, arguably—the people who are still losing their lives”.—[Official Report, 1/7/14; col. 1698.]

That was when events were still taking place afterwards. It also applies to the fate of Iraqi civilians. That should be a substantial part of this report.

I remember vividly an exchange at Question Time before 1 July 2014 when I complained about the delay and the noble Lord, Lord Hurd, a former Foreign Secretary, who is not here today, said that the delay was a scandal, whatever the reasons for it, on the body politic and the public interest. Why was it so important for them to turn on Saddam Hussein if regime change was not the main driver? Why did Tony Blair have those embarrassing exchanges in 2002 when there was no question of there being any declaration of war? Why did the then Government ignore the instinct and feelings of 1.5 million people marching down Piccadilly to protest about what was still an illegal war? Why did the Americans and the British ignore the wise advice of the French Government under President Chirac and Foreign Secretary Dominique de Villepin about the mistake of going to war on that occasion? Those things must come up now and all I say in response to the very apposite points made by the noble Lord, Lord Butler, is that it has to be quam celerrime and not too soon. We look forward to seeing the timetable on 3 November and then making a judgment. Possibly there should be another debate in the House of Lords on this matter as soon as possible after that.