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Iraq War Inquiry

Last week saw the sixth anniversary of the parliamentary debate that took us into the war in Iraq. Those of us who took part in that debate will never forget that day. Pressures were put on Members of Parliament on both sides of the House by their Whips, who told them that the case for war was overwhelming and that they should therefore support the Government's proposals on that matter. The result was that 140 Labour MPs voted contrary to what the Government wanted, as did all the Liberal Democrats and Members from the nationalist parties, and a small number of Conservatives. Nevertheless, this Parliament voted to take us into war, and every MP who took part in that vote must bear some responsibility for the decision they took that day. It is also important to remember that in putting the Government's case, the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, made it very clear, among other things, that this was a war to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, not a war for regime change—but the situation turned out to be somewhat different. We need to have an inquiry not only into what has happened in Iraq since the war but into all the decision making that led up to that war. I reiterate the point that I made in an intervention on the Foreign Secretary: all the relevant papers—the Cabinet papers, the Cabinet papers that were not delivered to the Cabinet but prepared for it, the legal advice that was prepared but not given, and the legal advice that was given—must form a part of that inquiry. When the Information Commissioner ruled that those papers should be made public because that was overwhelmingly in the public interest, the Justice Secretary decided that there was an overwhelming national security case for their not being revealed. We have been complicit in starting a war in Iraq in which well over half a million people have died, including, tragically, many service people of all countries—and the instability continues. The ramifications of this war are absolutely enormous, and the case for an inquiry is overwhelming. I welcome the fact that the Foreign Secretary appears to have conceded that there will be an inquiry at some point, but I honestly do not see what the delay is all about. There is plenty of precedent for inquiries while troops are still on deployment; many examples have been given, so I will not go through them all again. I do not understand the idea that we should wait until the last British soldier is out of Iraq, if that is what the Foreign Secretary was saying. I suspect that some kind of training element will be there for a long time, and that will be used ever more as an excuse.