The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
51.
When No.10
asked for reading material for Mr Gordon Brown, the
Chancellor
of the Exchequer
in September 2002, Mr Scarlett provided the same
documents.20
52.
As set out in
Section 4.1, Mr Tom McKane, Deputy Head of OD Sec, was asked
in
March 2002
to chair an inter-departmental group to take forward work on the
substance
of a paper
for publication on Iraq.21
Mr Campbell
was to retain the lead role on the form
of the
document and timing of its publication.
53.
Mr McKane
sent the latest versions of the “three Iraq public documents: on
WMD,
Weapons
Inspections and Abuse of Human Rights” to Sir David Manning on 21
June,
asking
whether the three documents should be treated as a package or the
WMD paper
should be
published separately.22
Mr Scarlett’s
preference was for the latter, but most
officials
in the inter-departmental group thought the papers should be
published together.
54.
Mr McKane
also produced a draft Foreword “which could be issued in the
name
of
Mr Straw or jointly by him, Mr Hoon and Ms Short [the
International Development
Secretary]”.
55.
On 16 July,
Sir David Manning, Mr Powell and Mr Campbell agreed that
publication
of the
three papers on Iraq should be put on hold.23
56.
The Cabinet
Office paper of 19 July recommended that Ministers
should:
“Agree to
the establishment of an ad hoc group of officials under Cabinet
Office
chairmanship
to consider the development of an information campaign to be
agreed
57.
There was no
mention of that issue in the record of Mr Blair’s meeting on
23 July.25
58.
Mr McKane
told the Inquiry that the proposal had come from the MOD and that
he
had seen it
as related to, but separate from, the production of the
dossier.26
The
dossier
seemed to
him to be:
“… about
putting the fact[s] before the British public in a way that would
explain why
this [Iraq]
was a problem and a problem that had to be dealt with.
“So … it
might have formed an element of a broader information
campaign.”
20
Minute
Scarlett to Rycroft, 5 September 2002, ‘Iraq: Classified Reading
Material’.
21
Manuscript
note Rycroft to McKane, 25 March 2002, on Minute Ricketts to Patey,
22 March 2002,
‘Iraq: Preparing
Material for Public Release’.
22
Minute
McKane to Manning, 21 June 2002, ‘Iraq: Public
Documents’.
23
Minute
Manning to McKane, 16 July 2002, ‘Iraq: Public
Documents’.
24
Paper
Cabinet Office, 19 July 2002, ‘Iraq: Conditions for Military
Action’.
25
Minute
Rycroft to Manning, 23 July 2002, ‘Iraq: Prime Minister’s Meeting,
23 July’.
26
Public
hearing, 19 January 2011, pages 79-80.
124