New inquiry on Iraq fails to win over Lib Dems

Britain The Liberal Democrats have rejected the inquiry ordered by British Prime Minister Mr Tony Blair into the intelligence…

BritainThe Liberal Democrats have rejected the inquiry ordered by British Prime Minister Mr Tony Blair into the intelligence assessments which led Britain into war over Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

Closely following events in Washington, Mr Blair bowed to the inevitable yesterday, confirming that former cabinet secretary Lord Butler will head the six-member committee which will attempt to determine whether the pre-war intelligence was right or wrong.

In an attempt to bring closure to the post-war debate, the government sought cross-party consensus on the formation of the Butler Committee, whose work will be modelled on the Franks inquiry into the events leading to the Falklands war.

And, in answer to critics and sceptics, the government gave the committee a limited timescale, with a brief to report before parliament rises for the summer recess in late July. However, any hope Mr Blair had that the committee's findings would prove the last word on the issue ahead of an election year were dashed when the Liberal Democrat leader, Mr Charles Kennedy, decided that his party would have no part in it.

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After hours of unsuccessful negotiations, and two meetings with the prime minister, Mr Kennedy said it was a "matter of regret" that his party could not participate because the inquiry's terms of reference were "unacceptable" and its remit was "too narrow." Mr Kennedy said that any acceptable inquiry would have to address the "political judgments" flowing from intelligence assessments and what he called the "fundamental question", namely: "Did we go to war in Iraq on a false premise?"

The government dismissed this as an attempt to "re-run" the Hutton inquiry and Mr Blair told the Liaison Committee of Select Committee Chairmen that Lord Hutton's report had determined the "issue of good faith". Mr Blair, in turn, was determined that he would not "sub-contract" to a committee the question of "whether the war was right or wrong". That political judgment, he insisted, had to be for the government and for parliament.

However, Mr Kennedy countered: "An inquiry which excludes politicians from scrutiny is unlikely to command public confidence. Politicians should always be willing to answer for their judgment . . . There is now widespread public disbelief about the stated reasons for our participation in the war in Iraq . . ."

The Conservative leader, Mr Michael Howard, said he was "very surprised" by Mr Kennedy's stated reasons for boycotting the committee, on which senior Tory backbencher and former Northern Ireland minister Mr Michael Mates will serve alongside the Labour chairman of the Commons Intelligence and Security Committee, Ms Ann Taylor.

While Mr Howard suggested that Mr Kennedy might come to regret his decision, Mr Blair's comments certainly appeared to rule out the kind of inquiry Mr Kennedy would presumably favour - one which would examine the developing Blair/Bush relationship in the critical months before war was declared.

Mr Blair told the Commons Liaison Committee that he had decided an inquiry was now justified following recent comments by the former head of the Iraq Survey Group, Dr David Kay. But he asserted: "I do simply say that whatever is discovered as a result of that inquiry, I do not accept that it was wrong to remove Saddam Hussein or \ the world is not a safer or better place for that."