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By Elfyn Llwyd MP - 25th January 2011
The appointment of Cabinet Office insider to a senior position at the Iraq inquiry has left it "flawed and compromised", claims Plaid Cymru MP Elfyn Llwyd.
My investigations over the past nine months or so have led me to believe that the Chilcot inquiry process is flawed and compromised.
The secretary to the inquiry was appointed without reference to the Civil Service Code. In fact, Mrs Margaret Aldred was appointed having been the single nomination of the Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O’Donnell and her nomination confirmed by the chair of the inquiry Sir John Chilcot.
There is no evidence of any other candidate having been considered despite the fact that the process was meant to be transparent. The Cabinet Office has not produced any notes to verify what exactly the process was.
But why the concern, I hear you ask? Not only is this a serious breach of the Civil Service Code but also Mrs Aldred has major conflicts of interest in the role as Secretary to the Inquiry.
As deputy head of the foreign and defence policy secretariat Mrs Aldred chaired meetings of the Iraq senior officials group which co-ordinated policy on Iraq. Mrs Aldred was in that role for four and a half years – part of the period the Inquiry is looking at.
The inquiry secretary who has a key role is therefore a Cabinet Office insider who was appointed "because of her extensive previous involvement in Iraq". The Cabinet Office recognised the conflict of interest when pressed but said that steps would be taken to mitigate any conflict of interest. To date nothing is known of these measures.
Mrs Aldred’s section of the Cabinet Office drew up plans for regime change – an unlawful concept at international law. It is the Cabinet Office – the Joint Intelligence Committee and its staff that produced the so-called "dodgy-dossier". The Cabinet Office where she worked has most to answer for over the whole Iraq debate.
Can this Inquiry be independent? Or is it a Cabinet Office subsidiary. Mrs Aldred’s involvement and that of the section makes it difficult to know where the Cabinet Office ends and the Inquiry begins.
There remain several troubling questions about the Secretary to the Inquiry namely:
*What steps have been taken to manage the conflict of interest?
*Why was Margaret Aldred in Washington for three days three weeks prior to the announcement of the Inquiry.
*It appears that Margaret Aldred was involved in the rendition policy?
*Is Margaret Aldred’s role at the Inquiry as central as her role in Iraq policy at the Cabinet Office?
*Given the dubious conflicts of interest why is she the effective gatekeeper to the inquiry?
*Does she advise on lines of inquiry?
*Does she liaise with government about evidence?
*Was she involved in the drawing up of the obstructive protocol on disclosure which was published a month after her installation.
(Is she likely to draft the report?
These and several other questions require urgent and full replies because justice must be seen to be done – transparency and openness are paramount.
They are concepts which are signally absent from this inquiry process and I regret that one conclusion can very easily be drawn is that this inquiry process is flawed and compromised from its inception.
Elfyn Llwyd was elected as a Plaid Cymru MP in 1992. The Plaid Cymru parliamentary leader since 1997, he currently sits on the House of Commons justice committee.
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