The Report of the Iraq Inquiry

• hostility in some departments to Iraq deployments; and

• Iraq fatigue.

562. In response to those constraints on recruitment:

• The Government took steps to establish a UK cadre of deployable civilian

experts as part of a strategic review of the UK’s approach to stabilisation and

reconstruction. That process is addressed in Section 10.3.

• Individual departments introduced a range of ad hoc incentives to volunteer.

563. With the exception of problems associated with deploying volunteers from UK

police forces, addressed in detail in Section 12.1, the Inquiry has seen no indication that

difficulty attracting volunteers contributed to the delays in the deployment of UK civilians

to Iraq in the early months of the CPA.

564. On 25 July 2003, Sir Michael Jay reported that, since his request for volunteers

on 22 April, the Government had trained and deployed “over 100 civilian staff from

sixteen different branches of government”, an exercise he described as having

“no modern precedent”.372

565. A Treasury official recalled in mid‑2004 that he had been very impressed by

the turnout at an early meeting in the Treasury for people thinking of volunteering to

go to Iraq:

“We had some 60 or so people arrive for that meeting – a very high quality response

– in fact such a good response that we couldn’t meet everyone’s desire to go out to

Iraq at that point.” 373

566. By autumn 2003, as Ministerial pressure to deploy greater numbers of civilians

grew, departments faced increasing difficulty attracting volunteers. Ministers and officials

considered a range of incentives to aid recruitment.

567. The AHMGIR on 6 November 2003 discussed the need for CPA(South) to be

staffed “properly and quickly” and requested a report on recruitment.374

568. Mr Desmond Bowen, Head of the Cabinet Office Overseas and Defence

Secretariat (OD Sec), advised:

“It has not proved easy to recruit staff to serve in Iraq, despite financial inducements.

Successful candidates need to have the right technical skills, aptitude for building

Iraqi capacity and willingness to work in a difficult environment.” 375

372 Letter Jay to Turnbull, 25 July 2003, ‘Iraq: UK support for reconstruction’.

373 Paper Radio Technical Services, 19 July 2004, ‘Transcript of Treasury Seminar Held in London

on Monday, 19 July 2004’.

374 Minutes, 6 November 2003, Ad Hoc Group on Iraq Rehabilitation meeting.

375 Letter Bowen to Owen, 14 November 2003, ‘Iraq: CPA (South) Staff’.

344