Professional Documents
Culture Documents
102
1 (The short adjournment)
2 (2.00 pm)
3 MR DINGEMANS: Mr Scarlett, we have looked at the memo of
4 10th June 2003, CAB/18/49, which was Sir David Omand's
5 response to your minute of 9th June. Effectively, in
6 paragraph 2, he appears to conclude that he was
7 attracted by the idea that someone working in
8 consultation with other people would look at matters,
9 effectively; is that right?
10 A. Yes, that is right.
11 Q. Then we get a report from them on 9th July. Can I take
12 you to CAB/18/51? We can see this is a memo from
13 someone at Head of Security Policy Division, to you,
14 copied to Sir David Omand:
15 "You asked me to do some initial work on the
16 reported leaks to the media about the Iraq WMD dossier."
17 Then:
18 "... an analysis of the published accounts of the
19 '45 minutes' leaks to Gilligan."
20 Then if one continues over the page to paragraph 5,
21 there is reference to:
22 "... full analysis of the press reports and FISC
23 transcripts at Annex A and references to Gilligan's
24 source at annex B."
25 Can I take you on to annex B, which is page 55, and
103
1 ask you one question in relation to it. It is towards
2 the bottom of the page, at paragraph 4. You can see
3 this is someone who appears to have done an analysis of
4 knowledge of matters; for example, we can see, if we go
5 up to paragraph 3, the previous one is:
6 "Gilligan's latest meeting with source.
7 "Gilligan initiated the latest meeting ..."
8 He tells us where he got that from, the FAC
9 transcript, The Mail on Sunday article. Then if you go
10 down to paragraph 4:
11 "Source's knowledge of opposition to 45 minute
12 claim.
13 "The source has first or second-hand knowledge of
14 the opposition to inclusion of the 45-minute claim. He
15 stated the 45 minutes claim was included in the dossier
16 against our wishes because it wasn't reliable."
17 Then the transcript is noted, and comment:
18 "If source's claims concerning the double sourcing
19 of most of the JIC items is correct, it confirms a close
20 knowledge of the intelligence used for the dossier."
21 I am just wondering about the heading "Source's
22 knowledge of opposition to 45 minute claim."
23 It appears to be written on the basis that there was
24 opposition to the 45 minute claim. Do you agree with
25 that analysis of the document?
104
1 A. Well, no, I do not. I think it is an honest mistake.
2 The purpose of this document was not to analyse whether
3 or not there was opposition to the 45 minute claim. The
4 purpose of the document purely was to analyse the access
5 of Mr Gilligan's source.
6 Q. It is right, so far as Dr Kelly was concerned, that if
7 he said to Mr Gilligan that the material was single
8 sourced and it was added late, both matters were in fact
9 accurate?
10 A. Yes, they were correct.
11 Q. We now know more about Dr Kelly's involvement in the
12 latter stages of the dossier.
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. Can I then take you to 15th June? We have looked at the
15 10th June memo. On 15th June there is an article by
16 The Observer about mobile trailers. After that, did you
17 have any discussions with anyone about possible sources
18 for that story?
19 A. I had one brief discussion about that article with
20 Martin Howard. It may have been on -- the beginning of
21 the week after the article had appeared, because there
22 was a reference to a British official giving an opinion
23 about the mobile laboratories; and I asked Martin for
24 his view. Martin Howard told me that there were only --
25 this description of the British official could only be
105
1 or could only apply to up to four people, probably four
2 people; and one of those was Dr Kelly. That was the
3 first time that I had heard his name.
4 Q. I think we have heard from Mr Howard about the inquiries
5 that he made. Were you any party to these further
6 enquiries?
7 A. I was not an active party. Mr Howard told me he had
8 wondered whether Dr Kelly might not be the source for
9 the article; that Dr Kelly, as it happened, had rung him
10 from abroad to volunteer, as far as Mr Howard was
11 concerned, that he was not the source of the article.
12 Mr Howard said to me he wondered actually whether that
13 was true, and we took the conversation no further.
14 Q. 25th June, Mr Campbell gives evidence to the Foreign
15 Affairs Committee. I think it is right that you had
16 spoken with him on 24th June, helping him prepare for
17 his evidence; is that right?
18 A. Yes, that is right.
19 Q. FAC/2/287. If one goes down to question 1019,
20 Mr Chidgey asks Mr Campbell:
21 "You appreciate how important this issue is. The
22 accusation has been made that this document was
23 adjusted, altered, sexed up -- whatever -- for
24 a particular political purpose so one has to be somewhat
25 pedantic and get exactly to the bottom of how the
106
1 process worked. You said, and it is on the record
2 elsewhere, that this process took many months to evolve.
3 I think it would be very helpful if, perhaps not today
4 but shortly afterwards, you could let the Committee have
5 information on the suggestions that were made by you and
6 your team as this document evolved. For example, it
7 must be the case surely that in this process, as the
8 drafts were continuing or continuously upgraded or
9 amended, copies of earlier drafts would have been kept
10 electronically within your Department, within your team.
11 It would be very helpful if it was possible for us to
12 have copies of those earlier drafts so that we could
13 satisfy ourselves that there were no attempts to change
14 the essence of the document in order to pursue
15 a particular political point. Is that possible?"
16 Mr Campbell said this:
17 "Can I say again on that the JIC would have to be
18 content that they were willing to do that but that is
19 certainly something I can take back and ask them if they
20 are."
21 Did Mr Campbell in fact ask you whether he could
22 release copies of the dossier to the Foreign Affairs
23 Committee?
24 A. It was mentioned, briefly, by him to me; and I replied
25 that I was quite sure that my colleagues on the JIC
107
1 would not be happy for the drafts to be released to the
2 FAC.
3 Q. And why is that?
4 A. Well, there were two reasons. The first was that
5 discussion of the drafts and all the various questions
6 which would have arisen from the drafts, which would
7 have quickly got into matters of intelligence because
8 the drafts were very closely linked to underlying
9 intelligence and whether or not it could have been
10 included in the changes that were made and so on, was
11 properly a matter for the ISC. And it is with the
12 Intelligence and Security Committee that the Government
13 deals, as a Committee of Parliamentarians set up by
14 statute on intelligence matters.
15 That is the first point. The second point was even
16 leaving that matter aside, to pass over drafts, work in
17 progress, advice which is being formulated but is only
18 being formulated and is not anything which has been sort
19 of signed up to by the officials working on it, is, as
20 it were, revealing that process of formulation of advice
21 by officials, as I say, for Ministers. It falls
22 directly into that domain. It is an area where
23 certainly colleagues on the JIC I knew, but officials
24 I think more widely, feel strongly should remain
25 confidential for the good conduct of Government
108
1 business.
2 Q. We have heard from Mr Campbell, and indeed almost
3 everyone else who has come from the Government to talk
4 about this claim, that this was the most serious of
5 claims that could ever be made against the Government,
6 how important it was to set the record straight. Would
7 this not have been a public way of setting the record
8 straight?
9 A. It would have been. I have never been in any doubt
10 myself that presentation, if you like, of the full
11 drafts would reveal that the whole process was one of
12 integrity, and honest and rigorous and well founded.
13 But that does not get away from the fact that putting
14 forward the drafts in the way suggested here would not
15 have had the support of my colleagues; and I would not
16 have wanted to put it to them.
17 I might add there that separately and later the
18 drafts were handed to the Intelligence and Security
19 Committee, in response to their requests, and they
20 are -- have been with the Intelligence and Security
21 Committee since then; but amongst my colleagues on the
22 JIC, when that matter was being discussed, the worries
23 and concerns that I have just expressed to you were
24 forcefully expressed to me.
25 Q. Can I now take you to your next involvement with
109
1 Dr Kelly? You have had a discussion with Mr Howard
2 in June, after The Observer article. Do you have any
3 other dealings in relation to Dr Kelly in June at all?
4 A. No.
5 Q. When is the first time, in July, that you are made aware
6 that Dr Kelly is under discussion again?
7 A. It is on the evening of Friday 4th July. I can be
8 precise; at a meeting with Sir David Omand at 17.30 or
9 thereabouts.
10 Q. Right. You have a meeting with Sir David Omand. What
11 is discussed?
12 A. Well, I was due to meet him anyway, which is how I know,
13 because it was in my diary. David said to me,
14 straightaway, that he wanted to tell me and seek my
15 advice about a development which had been reported to
16 him by Sir Kevin Tebbit from the Ministry of Defence.
17 As I understood it, and that was the case, it had been
18 reported to him by telephone. Briefly, somebody had
19 come forward to the MoD to indicate that they might be
20 the source for the Gilligan story; and David gave me his
21 name.
22 Q. So you, on the Friday evening, or early Friday evening
23 know the name of Dr Kelly?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. And I think you are joined, we have heard from
110
1 Jonathan Powell and Sir David Manning, by them at about
2 6 o'clock, is that right?
3 A. No, not quite right. David Omand and I went -- arranged
4 to go across to David Manning's office in No. 10, and at
5 our initiative, to brief him as a member of the Prime
6 Minister's Office on this development.
7 LORD HUTTON: What did you think was the significance of
8 this development? I mean, what went through your head
9 when you were told that someone had come forward and
10 said he had had a meeting with Mr Gilligan, Mr Scarlett?
11 A. It did depend, of course, on what I actually knew about
12 what this person said at this point, which was not very
13 much and was not paper based in any way, it was an oral
14 briefing; but I was told, and David knew, that there had
15 been a meeting in a London hotel, that the question of
16 45 minutes had been discussed, no details, and that
17 Alastair Campbell's name had been mentioned. It was --
18 but there were other details which did not fit. I did
19 not learn immediately anything more about that. So what
20 went through my head was that there was a serious chance
21 that this was indeed the source who was being quoted by
22 Mr Gilligan.
23 LORD HUTTON: What went through your head then that you
24 thought there was a serious chance this might be the
25 source? Did you have any further thoughts as to what
111
1 that might lead to or what its significance might be, or
2 not at that stage? Can you help me with that?
3 A. It is always unwise to claim that one has all sorts of
4 rational thoughts in retrospect which one does not have
5 at the time.
6 LORD HUTTON: Quite.
7 A. I was aware -- it was my view, as I have already stated,
8 that Mr Gilligan's story was wrong.
9 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
10 A. And, therefore, either somebody had given him a wrong
11 story or he had added to a story that he had been
12 given --
13 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
14 A. -- by somebody, as it were, speaking genuinely, whatever
15 his opinion or knowledge happened to be, partial
16 probably. So it was one or the other.
17 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
18 A. And that being the case, and I thought it was quite
19 likely to be the second, when I heard that somebody had
20 come forward who did seem to have had some discussion
21 with Mr Gilligan about this, was saying that it was not
22 at all the account that Mr Gilligan had broadcast,
23 I clearly thought: well, this might be the answer to
24 what has happened. But I stress the word "might"
25 because, of course, I have learned over many years to be
112
1 careful in these situations.
2 LORD HUTTON: But the answer to what? To what would it be
3 the answer?
4 A. Well, my Lord, how this situation had arisen, what
5 information had been genuinely passed to Mr Gilligan at
6 the initial meeting and that he had had with his source,
7 and then whether or not he had added to it.
8 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
9 A. That, to my mind, was a sort of critical issue at the
10 centre of the affair, to explain how these allegations
11 had arisen and on what they were or were not based.
12 MR DINGEMANS: So you have the meeting then in No. 10 in
13 I think Sir David Manning's office.
14 A. Indeed.
15 Q. You discussed the matters you have outlined to his
16 Lordship, is that right?
17 A. Well, not exactly. We passed -- David Omand and
18 I explained to David Manning what we had understood from
19 Kevin Tebbit. We gave him the name, mentioned the name;
20 and I told him what I had already said to David Omand,
21 that I had one recollection of this name in relation to
22 The Observer article.
23 Q. Yes. Was anything decided at that meeting?
24 A. Nothing was decided at that meeting. The meeting was
25 joined by Jonathan Powell. It was noted that this was
113
1 relevant, this issue, to two big events which were due
2 to happen very shortly: one was the publication of the
3 FAC report, due on the Monday morning -- since this was
4 late Friday evening, this was virtually immediately; and
5 the meeting of the BBC governors, which I think had very
6 shortly before been announced for the Sunday evening.
7 Q. Were there any conclusions reached at the meeting?
8 A. My only other memory of the meeting was this was
9 something that might need to be dealt with as
10 a disciplinary matter and certainly would need to be
11 dealt with as a personnel matter within the Ministry of
12 Defence structures and would have to be handled
13 accordingly.
14 Q. Can I take you to CAB/19/2, which are some notes from
15 minute books we have now been provided. It says:
16 "John Scarlett, 4/7/3."
17 You can see from the top it is an extract from
18 Sebastian Madden's minute book. It says:
19 "David Kelly.
20 "-- MoD PACS.
21 "(FCO secondee)
22 "-- Not Gilligan's source but had met him in
23 a hotel?
24 "Next steps.
25 "-- disciplinary offence. Not OSA."
114
1 I imagine that means "Official Secrets Act", does
2 it?
3 A. That is right.
4 Q. Then Kevin Tebbit writing to, who is that?
5 A. Sir David Omand, Sir David Manning, John Scarlett,
6 et cetera.
7 Q. "Line to take.
8 "Saying no action being taken to make [it looks
9 like] the name public."
10 A. "To make things public", yes.
11 Q. And:
12 "SDO to warn Matthew/SDM."
13 So Sir David Omand to warn?
14 A. Matthew Rycroft; that would be the private secretary in
15 No. 10.
16 Q. And SDM?
17 A. Sir David Manning.
18 Q. That is a note of the meeting you appear to have had
19 before you went over to No. 10.
20 A. Yes, it must have been because I do not recall Sebastian
21 Madden coming with us when we went to No. 10.
22 Q. Then CAB/11/3. This is a document you produced after
23 the event, but is described as an aide memoir, "Meetings
24 at which I was present". If we go to the bottom of
25 CAB/11/4 you can see it is your document, John Scarlett,
115
1 dated 21st July 2003. Going back to 4th July, this is
2 your note of the meeting:
3 "MoD official has come forward [name given] sounds
4 like Gilligan's source. Noted that normal MoD
5 procedures must be followed and appropriate legal advice
6 taken."
7 Did you know or did anyone tell you what the normal
8 MoD personnel procedures were?
9 A. No.
10 Q. Do you know whether or not any legal advice was taken at
11 this stage?
12 A. No. That is a reference to David Manning, it was, at
13 the meeting, who said that it might be necessary or we
14 would need to consider the question of legal advice, but
15 there was no further discussion at that point.
16 Q. Then you can see the reference to BBC governors and the
17 FAC, which you have told us about.
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. That is on 4th July. Do you actually see
20 Sir Kevin Tebbit's letter?
21 A. Yes, I do, shortly before I go home.
22 Q. Which is at MoD/1/35. I am not sure we need to see that
23 again unless there is anything you want to identify in
24 that.
25 A. No.
116
1 Q. On 5th July I think you are told about a second letter
2 Sir Kevin Tebbit is going to write?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. That is because he has read an article in The Times that
5 morning and he has told us he came into work?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. What were your discussions that weekend?
8 A. They were very brief. I was told by the Cabinet Office
9 duty officer that we had a copy sent to me of
10 Kevin Tebbit's letter very briefly what with that was.
11 I did not go into the office to look at it. I discussed
12 it over the phone or I heard about it over the phone.
13 I then spent some time at home looking through the
14 transcripts from the Foreign Affairs Committee and the
15 meeting with Andrew Gilligan, because I knew, although
16 I could not remember all the details, there had been
17 discussion there about the precise nature and number of
18 Andrew Gilligan's sources.
19 Q. You dictated, on Monday morning, a document. Can I take
20 you to CAB/1/46?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. Is this the document you put together, thinking about it
23 over the weekend, as it were, and dictate up -- if you
24 go down to the bottom of the page you can see John Muir,
25 7th July.
117
1 A. Yes, that is my private secretary.
2 Q. You dictate the following that you:
3 " ... agree with Kevin Tebbit's letter of Saturday
4 that the finger points strongly at David Kelly as
5 Gilligan's source."
6 That was your analysis, was it?
7 A. Yes, based on my reading of the transcripts and my
8 knowledge of the affair generally, that was what I was
9 thinking very first thing on Monday morning.
10 Q. Then you attached two copies of the FAC transcript which
11 you thought made that proposition good, as it were.
12 Then you say this:
13 "If he could have referred to any corroborating
14 information he would have done so. If this is true,
15 Kelly is not telling the whole story.
16 "Gilligan must have got the 45 minute single
17 intelligence report item from somewhere, presumably
18 Kelly."
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. That is because you worked out that Mr Gilligan had said
21 two things that were not known to the public, is that
22 right?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. One, that the 45 minutes was late.
25 A. Yes.
118
1 Q. And two, that it was single source.
2 A. Yes. Yes.
3 Q. So those two things Mr Gilligan must have found out from
4 someone?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. If Dr Kelly is the single source, then it must have been
7 through Dr Kelly?
8 A. Yes, if there was only one source -- and that was the
9 meaning of the FAC transcripts, that there was only one
10 source. If there had been a conversation as described
11 by Dr Kelly between himself and Mr Gilligan at that
12 time, then either it -- the chances of it also
13 containing references or being the point at which
14 Mr Gilligan learned these two items of information or
15 there being some other conversation with another source
16 and that Mr Gilligan was not regarding Dr Kelly as
17 a source at all, those were the two possibilities. But
18 if he was not regarding Dr Kelly as a source at all, it
19 sort of seemed to me extremely unlikely he would not
20 have made some reference to him, the existence of such
21 a conversation, in his conversation with the FAC as
22 corroboration on a point where he was under some
23 pressure to explain why he was placing so much reliance
24 on one particular source.
25 Q. So you have worked out over the weekend that Dr Kelly
119
1 has not given the full story to the Ministry of Defence
2 or probably not given the full story to the Ministry of
3 Defence?
4 A. Well, as I understood it, on the basis of very partial
5 knowledge of what had actually happened between Dr Kelly
6 and the MoD, because I had seen the letter giving
7 a fairly brief summary of the interview between Dr Kelly
8 and Mr Hatfield and the MoD and conclusions, but it gave
9 very few details actually about that interview. And
10 also I heard a brief oral account and I had seen or
11 heard of Kevin Tebbit's letter of Saturday -- so I did
12 not have a full understanding of that. But on the basis
13 of what I had been told, these important points about:
14 where did Mr Gilligan get the knowledge about the report
15 arriving late and it being based on one intelligence
16 report, where did he learn that from?
17 Q. Because if we go back to MoD/1/34, which is the letter
18 of 4th July that I think you said you saw on the Friday
19 night --
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. -- and go to the bottom of the page, second bullet as it
22 were, you can see that:
23 "On the issue of 45 minutes [this is after
24 Dr Kelly's interview on 4th July], raised by Gilligan,
25 he said he did not know to what it refers (not having
120
1 access to the intelligence report)."
2 That is the comment you considered at the least
3 doubtful after what your analysis had shown over the
4 weekend?
5 A. Well, it seemed possible, maybe more than possible that
6 it did not tell the full story.
7 Q. Going then back to CAB/1/46, that is why you recommend
8 a "security style" interview. Do you want to explain
9 what you mean by that?
10 A. I made this comment very quickly on the Monday morning,
11 before I went off to another meeting. I had tried to
12 ring David Omand just to make these points to him by
13 telephone but he was engaged elsewhere. This note here
14 I therefore dictated to my private secretary. It was
15 for David Omand only, it was not copied more widely, and
16 it was my advice to him. It was not an action document
17 in any way. What I meant was that the interview that
18 had taken place so far seemed to me to leave important
19 questions uncovered, these needed to be pursued, and so
20 a further interview was necessary. That interview would
21 need to be thorough and forensic, and designed to reach
22 as satisfactory an answer as possible, one way or the
23 other, to these outstanding questions. I thought and
24 meant no more than that.
25 Q. Right. Then I think on 7th July in the morning you go
121
1 to --
2 LORD HUTTON: I think the suggestion has been that those
3 words rather convey someone is to be quite seriously
4 grilled.
5 A. I thought, my Lord, no more than I have just said.
6 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
7 A. That I thought there were some outstanding facts/points
8 here which needed to be got clear, and that a further
9 interview was going to be necessary and it would need to
10 be more thorough than was the impression I had of the
11 interview which had taken place on the Friday. I did
12 not give it any more thought than that.
13 MR DINGEMANS: You then attend a meeting with the
14 Prime Minister; is that right?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. And I think there are two meetings, one at 9 o'clock and
17 one at 9.30?
18 A. There is one shortly after 9 o'clock and then one at
19 9.30.
20 Q. They are mainly discussions about the Foreign Affairs
21 Committee report.
22 A. Indeed.
23 Q. There is a brief discussion about Dr Kelly. What is
24 said at that stage, at the first meeting?
25 A. At the first meeting, very briefly, the Prime Minister
122
1 had asked to see me, so I had left a separate meeting
2 I was attending in Alastair Campbell's office about the
3 Foreign Affairs Committee report. I went to see him.
4 I was with him for a very short while. Jonathan Powell
5 was the only other person there. He wanted to know what
6 the arrangements were for discussing the Foreign Affairs
7 Committee report. I told him what was planned, we would
8 be coming along at 9.30. Then there was a brief
9 reference to the fact that somebody had come forward
10 from the MoD and that we -- I mean, I knew that he knew
11 about it and he probably wanted to know whether I knew
12 about it. I cannot quite remember. And I recall that
13 I mentioned Dr Kelly's name certainly at that meeting,
14 but I am afraid I do not know whether the Prime Minister
15 already knew the name, and the Prime Minister commented
16 that it was going to be necessary to know more and to
17 learn more; and that was it. I then rejoined the
18 meeting in Alastair Campbell's office.
19 Q. Then, do you have a further meeting with the
20 Prime Minister at about 9.30?
21 A. Well, I along with others who had been in
22 Alastair Campbell's office went, as agreed, to the
23 Prime Minister's Office where a meeting was already in
24 progress.
25 Q. And was anything said about Dr Kelly at that meeting?
123
1 A. Most of that meeting was on the FAC report and how to
2 react to it.
3 Q. Yes.
4 A. There was a discussion, at the end, about Dr Kelly.
5 Kevin Tebbit was at the meeting. There was, as
6 I recall, discussion as to whether he might or might not
7 be Mr Gilligan's source.
8 It was noted, I do remember Kevin Tebbit saying that
9 there were a number of points where his story
10 importantly diverged from Mr Gilligan's. He also did
11 say that he had been explicit in saying he had not said
12 anything about Alastair Campbell. It was sort of -- it
13 was agreed, at the end, that he could be the source. It
14 was impossible to know, without knowing more. And there
15 was consensus around the meeting that he should be
16 interviewed again.
17 Q. Can I take you to your note? We have looked at your
18 note for 4th July. It is CAB/11/3. For 7th July this
19 is a note you make, scrolling down the page. First
20 meeting:
21 "Brief discussion of whether Dr Kelly should be the
22 source. Prime Minister states that it must be handled
23 according to proper MoD and Civil Service procedures."
24 Was there at that stage any discussion about what
25 those proper procedures were?
124
1 A. No, but the Prime Minister did state it.
2 Q. At the 9.30 meeting, again with the Prime Minister and
3 others that you list, then you say this:
4 "Brief discussion of MoD source. If he appeared
5 before a Committee, would he be likely to support or
6 otherwise the Government position? JSC"...
7 That is you I imagine, is that right?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. "... to seek advice from MoD. Was he/was he not the
10 source? No further decision possible without knowing
11 more about his contact with Gilligan."
12 Why was it important or does it appear to have been
13 important to find out whether he supported or otherwise
14 the Government position?
15 A. Whether or not it was important, it was not quite put
16 like that. It was -- there was a discussion, a brief
17 discussion, as to whether -- if, at some point, Dr Kelly
18 was questioned in public before a Committee, as
19 mentioned here, if that happened, what were his views on
20 the question of Iraq and Iraqi WMD? Were these
21 consistent with what the Government itself had been
22 saying and was saying or were they not? It was a
23 recognition that this was a point on which the
24 Government, you know, could usefully be informed, should
25 know what the situation was. It was no more than that.
125
1 Q. No firm decisions were taken then because everything was
2 awaiting the further interviews?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. We know he was interviewed later on that day by
5 Richard Hatfield, Martin Howard and Dr Wells was there.
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. And we have seen notes of that. Was any report made
8 back to you after the meeting, after the interview?
9 A. Martin Howard telephoned me at the end of the day to
10 give a brief verbal account of how the interview had
11 gone. It was very brief; and the points that I recall
12 from that telephone conversation were, first, that
13 Dr Kelly had repeated the same points that he had made
14 on Friday, and, in particular, had repeated his
15 conviction that he could not be the source for
16 Mr Gilligan.
17 Q. Right.
18 A. But that he had seemed less sure, on this occasion, than
19 he had before; and that in particular I quite clearly
20 remember Martin saying that he had begun to comment:
21 well, he was not quite sure of what had been said on
22 particular points and that maybe it could be that
23 Andrew Gilligan had led him on, but that was not defined
24 further.
25 LORD HUTTON: Just going back to your note on the 9.30
126
1 meeting on 7th July and the passage Mr Dingemans has
2 referred you to:
3 "Brief discussion of MoD source. If he appeared
4 before a Committee, would he be likely to support or
5 otherwise the Government position?"
6 That might be read as meaning that whether or not he
7 would be produced before a Committee might depend on
8 whether he would be likely to support or otherwise the
9 Government position.
10 A. It might be read like that, my Lord, but it is not my
11 memory of the discussion. My memory was that if he
12 appeared before a Committee, whether or not the
13 Government wanted it, what would he say? And there was
14 interest in knowing that in advance.
15 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
16 MR DINGEMANS: So Mr Howard has reported to you now the
17 second meeting. In relation to that, Mr Howard says:
18 I think he must be the single source.
19 A. Yes. I should add --
20 Q. For the reasons you have given.
21 A. He did say that as well.
22 Q. If he was the single source, then Dr Kelly must have
23 said: the 45 minutes was single sourced and it was added
24 late. Did you say to Mr Howard: well, what did he say
25 about these two points?
127
1 A. I do not think I did.
2 Q. Looking through the notes of interview, it does not look
3 as if Dr Kelly was asked about that. Do you know
4 anything about that?
5 A. I am afraid I do not remember enough detail of the notes
6 of the interview to answer that.
7 Q. Right. Was there any sort of understanding that: we
8 would leave aside those difficult areas about what you
9 have actually said to Mr Gilligan if you are a person
10 not able, as it were, to support the central thrust of
11 Mr Gilligan's report?
12 A. Not at all; no.
13 Q. You have had this discussion, then, with Mr Howard?
14 A. Hmm, hmm.
15 Q. Was there anything else that happened on the 7th July,
16 the Monday, so far as you recall?
17 A. Not that I recall.
18 Q. Did you have any input into any draft press statements,
19 at that stage, or discussions about draft press
20 statements?
21 A. No, I did not.
22 Q. Or defensive Q and A material?
23 A. No, I did not.
24 Q. On 8th July we know the Prime Minister is going off to
25 a Liaison Committee meeting. I think you attend
128
1 meetings at Downing Street; is that right?
2 A. It is right.
3 Q. The first meeting is at what time?
4 A. About 8.15.
5 Q. What is discussed then in relation to Dr Kelly?
6 A. Only one point. The Prime Minister was concerned that
7 he might be asked, at the Liaison Committee, whether,
8 for example, any leak inquiry was under way, whether
9 there was a serious effort to identify the source,
10 whether he had any idea or the Government had any idea
11 as to who the source might be.
12 Q. And we have heard that a form of holding answer was
13 agreed.
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. That enquiries were under way; but as I understand it,
16 he was not asked about that?
17 A. That is right.
18 Q. He comes back from that at about 11.30 or 11.45 on the
19 Tuesday.
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. Are you present at a meeting then?
22 A. I was not present at the very beginning of a meeting but
23 I joined it very quickly.
24 Q. What was discussed there?
25 A. Well, the basis of that meeting was the outcome of the
129
1 second interview, which was reported to the meeting by
2 David Omand.
3 Q. Which you have already heard of briefly the night
4 before.
5 A. Yes. I think David Omand gave some more detail; and he
6 had it anyway officially from Kevin Tebbit, as
7 I understand. Kevin Tebbit was not present at that
8 particular meeting, at that time, and so David Omand
9 reported the results. The conclusion of the second
10 interview was that the chances of Dr Kelly being the
11 single source for Mr Gilligan were significantly higher
12 than they had been before.
13 Q. And that was what prompted you to take -- everyone at
14 the meeting to take a course of action?
15 A. Well, the subsequent discussion at that meeting was
16 based on that assessment.
17 Q. That he was the single source?
18 A. Not that he was definitely, but that there was a much
19 higher chance or that there was a very serious chance
20 that he was.
21 Q. I think it has been stressed that there should be
22 Ministry of Defence personnel procedures followed?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. What does the meeting conclude? What is the conclusion
25 of that meeting at 11.30/11.45?
130
1 A. That meeting concluded that the ISC, Intelligence and
2 Security Committee, should be informed, in a letter,
3 that someone had come forward who might be the source
4 for the Andrew Gilligan report; that they should also be
5 told that there were important differences between this
6 person's account of the conversation and Mr Gilligan's
7 reported account; and that that person would be
8 available for interview by the ISC if the ISC so wanted;
9 that that would be a letter sent to the Chairman of the
10 ISC; that it would be copied to the Foreign Affairs
11 Committee, but it would be sent, as it were, for action
12 to the ISC; that it should not name the person
13 concerned.
14 Q. All that is decided at the meeting; is that right?
15 A. That was the provisional decision, if you like, at that
16 meeting; but it was dependent on further discussion,
17 detailed discussion, with the Ministry of Defence.
18 Q. Because I think you have stressed that everyone was keen
19 that Ministry of Defence personnel procedures be
20 followed.
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. A provisional decision is reached at that meeting; and
23 there is no-one from the Ministry of Defence there, is
24 there?
25 A. Yes, because we were waiting for Kevin Tebbit to arrive
131
1 for the meeting.
2 Q. I think he has told us he was handing out medals for
3 HMS Nottingham down in Portsmouth.
4 A. Yes.
5 LORD HUTTON: May I ask you, Mr Scarlett, at that stage if
6 the ISC was to be informed that a source had come
7 forward but the person was not to be named and the
8 letter to the ISC was to be copied to the FAC, did it
9 occur to you that it was then probable that in some way
10 or another the name would come out into the public
11 domain?
12 A. The discussion, my Lord, that we had at that meeting was
13 based on a sort of number of assessments or assumptions.
14 One of those was that the fact that somebody had come
15 forward would, whatever the Government did, become
16 public knowledge quickly, possibly very quickly.
17 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
18 A. Secondly, that Dr Kelly had been told that a public
19 statement would probably be made and that he had
20 accepted that, and that he had also been told that it
21 was very likely that at some point, it was not defined,
22 to my knowledge, his name would become known as the
23 person who had come forward and that he knew that.
24 LORD HUTTON: Yes. Why was it decided that his name should
25 be sent to the ISC? What, they were at the present
132
1 time, investigating, what, the reasons for the war
2 or ...
3 A. No, the ISC, my Lord, were in the early stages of an
4 inquiry into the role of intelligence in Iraq.
5 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
6 A. That they had been collecting documentation in support
7 of this inquiry and that they were to begin having oral
8 sessions with witnesses the following morning. Indeed,
9 I was due to be the first witness before them. So their
10 inquiry was, as it were, getting underway.
11 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
12 A. That was the inquiry with which the Government were
13 cooperating with all matters relating to intelligence.
14 Indeed, the inquiry was about the role of intelligence
15 in Iraq.
16 LORD HUTTON: Why inform the ISC that this source had come
17 forward? The reason may be obvious but I would just
18 like you to say.
19 A. No, it was our view and the view of the meeting, and
20 this was a recommendation made to the meeting initially
21 by David Omand, that the ISC were the proper body to be
22 investigating all aspects of the role of intelligence in
23 Iraq, including those aspects relating to the September
24 public assessment and including the controversy which by
25 then existed around that assessment. So they were the
133
1 right Committee to be dealing with it.
2 LORD HUTTON: We have heard that the ISC conduct their
3 proceedings in private.
4 A. Yes, my Lord.
5 LORD HUTTON: They report to the Prime Minister.
6 A. Yes, my Lord.
7 LORD HUTTON: Do their reports ever become public or are
8 they kept private?
9 A. No, all their reports become public, but they are
10 subject to redaction by agreement between the Government
11 and the Committee; if that redaction is justified on
12 national security grounds only.
13 LORD HUTTON: They are published by whom, by the Prime
14 Minister's Office or by the ISC?
15 A. I think by the Government.
16 LORD HUTTON: They are made public in any event?
17 A. Yes.
18 LORD HUTTON: Thank you.
19 MR DINGEMANS: Was anything said about Dr Kelly's continued
20 cooperation at this stage, with the interviewing
21 process?
22 A. At that stage only what I have already said.
23 Q. Can I just take you to CAB/11/6? This is a note that
24 I know you did not make but is dated 21st July and it is
25 made by Sir David Omand. If one goes to the top of the
134
1 page, and this is in relation to the 7th July meeting,
2 Kevin:
3 "Kevin Tebbit said the MoD were considering calling
4 him back to talk to him again. He reiterated that
5 Dr Kelly had come forward of his own volition. As far
6 as the MoD was concerned, no question of an offence
7 under the Official Secrets Act. Dr Kelly's continued
8 cooperation was therefore essential."
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Had anyone asked Dr Kelly whether he wanted to be sent
11 off to the ISC?
12 A. My understanding was that he had been told that he would
13 be likely -- he might very well be called before
14 a Committee if his name became public, and that he
15 accepted that would happen.
16 Q. After the meeting you would go away to draft a letter?
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. Which I think we see at CAB/18/68 to 69.
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. This is a document that is not sent; is that right?
21 A. Yes, that is right. I should say that I was doing this
22 because it had been agreed at the meeting that
23 David Omand would -- it was his suggestion that the ISC
24 should be informed and that he should write to the
25 Chairman of the Committee. But David Omand was about to
135
1 go on an official trip to Canada and literally had no
2 choice but to leave straightaway. So it was agreed
3 I would take over from him and represent him and that
4 I would draft a letter.
5 This is the draft which I put together after the end
6 of that meeting and it was -- certainly it was never
7 sent, but it was produced as the basis for initial
8 discussion at a meeting at 1330. And it reflected the
9 provisional agreement and discussion which I have just
10 described.
11 As you can see, it is entitled "Letter from
12 Sir Kevin Tebbit..." Well, that is what it says because
13 that is what, you know, was recorded as the draft. My
14 memory of the meeting certainly is that it was agreed
15 that David Omand should write, but there was some
16 discussion as to whether the ISC should be properly
17 informed by the security intelligence coordinator or the
18 Ministry of Defence, and probably what I drafted
19 reflected that discussion. I simply do not remember.
20 Q. Can I take you down to the third paragraph of that
21 letter:
22 "This individual is an expert on WMD but was not
23 'one of the senior officials in charge of drawing up the
24 dossier'. He is not a member of the Intelligence
25 Services. Nor is he a member of the Senior Civil
136
1 Service. He did not have access to the intelligence
2 report on 45 minutes and was not involved in discussions
3 about whether or how this information should be used in
4 the September dossier. He says that he made no
5 allegations or accusations about the issue related to
6 the dossier, in particular that the 45 minute
7 intelligence had been inserted by Mr Campbell or
8 Downing Street against the wishes of the intelligence
9 community.
10 "He made no other comment about Alastair Campbell.
11 When asked by Mr Gilligan why the 45 minute report was
12 in the dossier, he commented that 'it was probably for
13 impact'."
14 That letter appears to be written on the basis that
15 Dr Kelly knows nothing about all these things. Did you
16 know, at this stage, that Dr Kelly was probably the
17 source for Mr Gilligan's accurate claims that the
18 45 minutes was added late and single sourced?
19 A. I did not know that, at that time.
20 Q. But you suspected it?
21 A. Yes, I did.
22 Q. And yet, I mean, it is only a draft.
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. But it is fair to say this, is it not: there is not much
25 hint of that suspicion in the draft letter?
137
1 A. Can you just go back to the earlier -- beginning?
2 Q. Yes.
3 A. What is written there answers the point as to whether he
4 would have had the kind of access which would have been
5 necessary to have stood up the Andrew Gilligan report.
6 Q. But you are just looking at one part of the
7 Andrew Gilligan report; and I have asked Mr Gilligan
8 about all his report, part of it in relation to claims
9 that the Government knew it was false. And we asked
10 whether or not there was anything to support that. But
11 part of the report was the 45 minutes was late; and part
12 of the report was that the 45 minutes was single
13 sourced. If that came from Dr Kelly, it rather suggests
14 that Dr Kelly's access to intelligence was slightly
15 higher than you are putting it in this draft letter.
16 A. Well, I am not sure I would agree with that. Whoever it
17 was who was Mr Gilligan's source was making his
18 statements many months after the fact of the compilation
19 of the dossier; and so whoever it was might have been
20 hearing things from somebody who was involved.
21 Q. And did you, at this stage, think: we are now about to
22 put him before the Intelligence and Security Committee,
23 we are going to write a letter, we had better find out
24 what he actually did do in relation to the September
25 dossier, or were no enquiries made?
138
1 A. We did not discuss making any further interviews, as
2 I recall, at that meeting.
3 Q. But you have decided he has to go away for what you call
4 a "security style" interview, and you have explained
5 what you mean by that, and he has gone off for that
6 interview.
7 Surely another thing to chase down would be what he
8 actually did in relation to the September dossier? That
9 would have been, one assumes, a fairly easy enquiry to
10 make.
11 A. At this particular stage, at this particular discussion,
12 I had not seen a full account of the second interview.
13 We had heard the conclusions of the second interview,
14 not the detail.
15 Q. Right. So you write this draft letter. But you get
16 some further communications from the Intelligence and
17 Security Commission, is that right?
18 A. Committee, yes.
19 Q. Sorry, Committee.
20 A. Yes, we receive a message from them some time after
21 13.30, after a further meeting has convened.
22 Q. What are you told?
23 A. I should explain at the end of this meeting, and before
24 going to Canada, Sir David Omand had communicated with
25 the Clerk of the Committee to tell him what was
139
1 proposed, and the Clerk had then replied, reporting
2 a comment from the Chairman, that the Chairman did not
3 wish to receive the letter that was proposed but would
4 be content if there were to be a public statement which
5 would contain a reference to the fact that the person
6 concerned would be available for interview with the
7 Intelligence and Security Committee. That was the
8 message which came back from the Clerk.
9 Q. So what did everyone decide to do, issue a public
10 statement?
11 A. There was no decision to do anything; but the next step
12 in the discussion in the 13.30 meeting was to put to one
13 side this draft here of a letter and to look at
14 a possible draft for a public statement.
15 Q. Did you look at any drafts for public statements?
16 A. There was some initial drafting of the main points to be
17 covered at that meeting in the Prime Minister's office,
18 and then the meeting came to an end.
19 Q. Can I take you to MoD/1/56, which is actually the press
20 statement as is issued.
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. There are some various comments we have seen that have
23 been made on it in the past. You do not appear to have
24 written anything on the press statement.
25 A. No, I did not.
140
1 Q. Did you make any contribution to the drafting of it?
2 A. Not specifically. I was present at the discussion in
3 the Prime Minister's office which initially set out the
4 terms of the press statement. And then I was present at
5 a meeting in Godric Smith's office, where the press
6 statement was drafted in more detail.
7 Q. You can see here that if one looks at the end of the
8 first paragraph:
9 "The official has told us that he made no
10 allegations or accusations about the dossier and, in
11 particular, did not suggest that any material had been
12 added to the dossier by Alastair Campbell or
13 Downing~Street against the wishes of the intelligence
14 community. He is not a member of the Intelligence
15 Services or the Defence Intelligence Staff."
16 You have told us before the meeting at 11.30 you had
17 not actually seen the notes of the second interview.
18 A. Hmm.
19 Q. We are now about to put out a press statement to the
20 world at large, and everyone is obviously concerned not
21 to mislead anyone. Has anyone yet checked to see
22 whether Dr Kelly had anything to do with the September
23 drafting of the dossier?
24 A. This statement, again, was drawn up -- in fact, it was
25 drawn up in some detail in the presence of Kevin Tebbit,
141
1 who by that time had joined the meeting; but the whole
2 subject was subject to agreement by the Ministry of
3 Defence, who were the people who held the details of the
4 second interview.
5 Q. Well, had you checked --
6 A. I had not checked.
7 Q. And did anyone tell you that they had checked to see
8 what Dr Kelly --
9 A. They did not.
10 Q. Did you not think that it was something that ought to be
11 addressed?
12 A. I do not recall any discussion of that point in the
13 meeting.
14 Q. We know on 8th July that Mr Howard is also writing to
15 you -- this is CAB/1/77 -- about Dr Kelly's views of the
16 Iraqi WMD programme. If we scroll down we can see that
17 in paragraph 1:
18 "What reflects points made by David Kelly in his
19 letter [which we know to have been 30th June] and his
20 interviews."
21 Then he talks about his knowledge of WMD programme:
22 "No unease about the dossier."
23 On the 45 minute deployment issue, at the bottom, he
24 says his standard view is he does not know the
25 intelligence and is not familiar with an Iraqi weapons
142
1 system.
2 The only other point, over the page, to note was
3 that 30 per cent change of CW production capability, and
4 he distinguishes between production and possession.
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Why is this letter being written to you?
7 A. Because I had asked for those views to be reported to me
8 on 7th July. I had taken that away as an action which
9 I understood had been left with me after the early
10 morning meeting on 7th July in the Prime Minister's
11 Office.
12 Q. If we go back to CAB/1/77 and go to the top, we can see
13 some handwriting. Whose handwriting is that?
14 A. Sadly it is mine.
15 Q. I think we have managed to work out some more of what it
16 says:
17 "See over the page and the attached extract from
18 Gilligan's evidence to the FAC."
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. "Note ..."
21 You will have to help me with the second word?
22 A. "Also".
23 Q. "... that Kelly may state his view, if given the chance
24 by the FAC, that the trailers are not for BW production.
25 It is not clear ..."
143
1 "To me" is that?
2 A. Even I cannot read that. It seems to be "to me".
3 Q. "... how widely the FAC will go in their questioning."
4 Was there concern that the FAC might go widely in
5 their questioning?
6 A. It was the same point that had been registered on the
7 Monday, and I was writing this on the Thursday, that it
8 would be useful to know what he would or would not say
9 at the -- for example, before the FAC. Useful in the
10 sense that it is just always useful to know points which
11 have an impact of one kind or another on the position of
12 the Government, no more than that. So I am addressing
13 that particular interest by writing this comment.
14 The main purpose of this manuscript note is to draw
15 the attention of the addressees to what is over the
16 page, the underlined bit, which relates to his views on
17 the likelihood of production and possession of weaponry,
18 because that is very closely similar to the views
19 recorded by Andrew Gilligan as being held by his source.
20 It is not identically the same; and in my view that
21 underlined strongly the chance that he was actually
22 Mr Gilligan's source. That is why I sent that note
23 through to No. 10.
24 LORD HUTTON: Mr Scarlett, may I just ask you: are you able
25 to make any comment on the penultimate line of the first
144
1 page of that letter, that Dr Kelly says that his
2 standard view is that he does not know the intelligence
3 and is not familiar with an Iraqi weapons system that
4 matches that sort of timescale? Now, I think that
5 Dr Kelly had suggested to someone else that the source
6 for the 45 minutes reference might have confused it with
7 some multiple barrelled Iraqi weapon. Are you able to
8 make any comment -- and if, for security reasons, you
9 cannot please just say so, but are you able to comment
10 on that comment by Dr Kelly: he is not familiar with an
11 Iraqi weapons system that matches that sort of
12 timescale?
13 A. I can only make a limited comment, my Lord.
14 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
15 A. Which, I think, may not be relevant; but certainly
16 Andrew Gilligan, when quoting his source, said that the
17 source believed that the report was relating to warheads
18 for missiles.
19 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
20 A. Which, in fact, it was not; it related to munitions,
21 which we had interpreted to mean battlefield mortar
22 shells or small calibre weaponry, quite different from
23 missiles.
24 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
25 A. So it is possible that Dr Kelly, who, as I still
145
1 understand it, never did see or probably did not see the
2 original report, was in a state of genuine confusion
3 about what the report actually said.
4 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
5 A. And that could explain that particular comment, but I am
6 not sure.
7 LORD HUTTON: Yes. I see. Thank you.
8 MR DINGEMANS: That is 8th July, Mr Howard's writing to you.
9 Can I take you to CAB/11/134, because you get an e-mail
10 from Claire Sumner on 7th July to Alastair Campbell but
11 copied to you and David Manning and Jonathan Powell:
12 " I am being chased by the Clerk on this -- what is
13 the view?"
14 There is a reply on behalf of David Manning:
15 "I see no reason for Alastair to do this. He has
16 been exonerated by the FAC [obviously the report of
17 7th July]. ISC should concentrate on intelligence
18 issues, talking to heads of agencies and Chairman of
19 JIC."
20 Was that your view as well, that it would really be
21 appropriate for the ISC to concentrate on intelligence
22 issues, the heads of agencies and yourself, rather than
23 speak to someone like Dr Kelly?
24 A. I did not have a strong view one way or the other on
25 this, and I did not record one.
146
1 Q. On 8th July we know that the press statement is issued.
2 There is also some defensive Q and A material that is
3 issued. Were you party to any discussions in relation
4 to that?
5 A. No, I was not.
6 Q. Do you have any view on the propriety or otherwise of
7 that defensive Q and A material?
8 A. No, I do not.
9 Q. If we turn to CAB/1/87, we can see a further exchange on
10 9th July, with you being copied in, from Claire Sumner
11 to Alastair Campbell confirming he is going to appear
12 from 8.30 to 9.45 on 17th July and will have to leave
13 promptly:
14 "I asked where they were with other interviews.
15 "The ISC Clerk told me that the Committee were not
16 interested in interviewing Andrew G as he could not say
17 anything more to them than the FAC.
18 "He said that on the source they were waiting for
19 David Omand to write to them with correspondence. He
20 implied that he did not believe it was the source so
21 could not see the point of ISC seeing him and said they
22 were not interested in the BBC/AC row."
23 Did you see this e-mail?
24 A. I did.
25 Q. What was your view on it?
147
1 A. Well, my immediate view was that the Clerk had, for
2 understandable reasons, sort of misunderstood the
3 situation because he was resting his view on the view
4 which had been taken at the end of the week before by
5 the -- that is right, the end of the week before by the
6 FAC, and that was a view which I thought was unlikely to
7 be true and so the other thought which went through my
8 mind was that when the Committee -- if the Committee
9 came to the view that indeed he was the source, then
10 they would take a different view.
11 Q. But one of the things that would convince them that he
12 was the source was showing them he had actually made the
13 comments about the 45 minutes and --
14 A. I am sorry, can I just correct myself there? I am
15 muddling that up. The FAC conclusion, of course, had
16 not been recorded at that stage. I am sorry, I am
17 getting my dates wrong.
18 Q. On the --
19 A. In fact, he did not believe it was the source. That
20 must be based -- the view of the Clerk of the ISC there
21 must be based on the fact that the source had said, you
22 know, he was not the source.
23 Q. The Clerk of the ISC must have seen, by then, the
24 Ministry of Defence press statement because that is
25 issued on 8th July.
148
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. So it is obviously basing it on that.
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. But one reason the Clerk may have been muddled was
5 because the press statement did not say: Mr Gilligan was
6 right about the 45 minutes being added late, he was
7 right about it being single source. But that is not
8 surprising because Dr Kelly would have known that for
9 this reason: namely his involvement in the drafting with
10 the dossier in September.
11 A. Sorry, can I ask you to repeat that? I am not quite
12 sure I am following you.
13 Q. The MoD press statement, I have already asked you about
14 whether or not that was accurate.
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. Because it did not tell anyone that Dr Kelly had an
17 involvement in drafting the dossier in September, did
18 it?
19 A. That was because at that stage, to be clear about this,
20 I and the others involved did not know that he had had
21 any involvement, even of a minimal kind, in the drafting
22 of the intelligence parts of the September dossier.
23 Q. But on 7th July you had noted in your note that Dr Kelly
24 must or there was a strong probability that Dr Kelly was
25 not telling the whole truth about what he had said to
149
1 Andrew Gilligan because he must have got the 45 minutes
2 from someone.
3 A. Yes, but he could have learned that from somebody who
4 was involved in the drafting of the dossier.
5 Q. He is sent off or offered to the ISC on that basis, that
6 it was assumed that he must have picked it up in general
7 conversations?
8 A. No, I do not think that is a fair representation of what
9 happened at all.
10 Whether or not he was the source for
11 Andrew Gilligan's knowledge about the 45 minute report
12 coming in late and being based on one report, the
13 conversation which he reported as having had with
14 Andrew Gilligan meant there was a very high chance that
15 he was Andrew Gilligan's single source.
16 Q. I have asked you about Mr Howard's letter to you. Can
17 I just take you to another document, CAB/1/106, which is
18 a letter of 14th July which is from Colin Smith of the
19 Counter Proliferation Strategy CPD, and he writes in
20 1(a):
21 "DCDI is to brief David Kelly this afternoon for his
22 appearances tomorrow before the FAC and the ISC, and
23 will strongly recommend that Kelly is not drawn on his
24 assessment of the dossier (but stick to what he told
25 Gilligan). Kelly is apparently feeling the pressure and
150
1 does not appear to be handling it well."
2 Were you party to any discussions about what
3 Dr Kelly should or should not be drawn on in front of
4 any of the Committees?
5 A. Only very briefly, in the following sense: that I had
6 a brief conversation, I cannot remember on which day,
7 with Martin Howard where I noted to him that it was
8 going to be important that Dr Kelly had proper support
9 before he appeared before the Foreign Affairs Committee
10 and received a briefing. By that I meant, but I am not
11 sure whether I spelled it out, that if he was going to
12 be appearing and might be asked about a range of
13 questions, it was going to be necessary for it to be
14 clear that he was not speaking as a spokesman of
15 Government policy for the Ministry of Defence, that the
16 views he might have on areas of expertise were his own
17 particular views and other experts might have other
18 views. That was the issue that was in my mind.
19 I recall Martin saying to me that he was giving him
20 very detailed support but of course he would be able to
21 say what he liked before the Committee. That was the
22 end of that conversation.
23 Q. So do the terms of the letter slightly surprise you,
24 that it is being recommended -- strongly recommended --
25 that Kelly is not drawn on his assessment of the
151
1 dossier?
2 A. (Pause). You know, at the time I had no particular, you
3 know, thoughts about that point. I honestly cannot say
4 that I, you know, dwelt on it.
5 Q. I did not ask for your views at the time but now. Are
6 you slightly surprised by the terms of that letter?
7 A. Not really.
8 Q. And why is that?
9 A. (Pause). I am not even completely sure that this is an
10 accurate record of this discussion. This record is
11 a note made, I think, by somebody in the FCO who
12 attended a meeting which I chaired on 14th July.
13 I recall DCDI, Martin Howard, talking about his briefing
14 of David Kelly that afternoon. I do not recall
15 particularly what he said. And I do also recall him
16 saying that Dr Kelly was beginning to show signs of
17 feeling some pressure. So I do remember him making
18 these comments; but I am not sure that the rest of it is
19 accurate. It is not an official record of the meeting,
20 it is an internal note within the FCO.
21 Q. Perhaps we can have the official record when you go
22 back, if there are other records of this meeting.
23 A. Certainly, if there are.
24 Q. That is very kind.
25 LORD HUTTON: Did you make any comment or did you ever send
152
1 any minute or e-mail to anyone about Dr Kelly being
2 under pressure if he went to give evidence before the
3 FAC or the ISC?
4 A. No, I did not, my Lord. I would add that I saw the
5 management of that to be a matter absolutely for the
6 Ministry of Defence, who were in possession of all the
7 information and I was not.
8 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
9 MR DINGEMANS: Can I help you in relation to your last
10 question. At CAB/11/4, Tuesday 8th July, and we know
11 this is a minute made after the event, if one scrolls
12 down the page, 1330 meeting:
13 "Discussion of how BBC will react (will they be
14 ready to discuss this in a business-like way). If
15 Dr Kelly name becomes public will Government be
16 criticised for putting him under 'wider pressure'? PM
17 repeats that MoD must remain in charge and follow their
18 procedures."
19 That is all I have been able to see where you draft
20 anything referring to pressure; is that right?
21 A. Yes. I recall that discussion. There was a brief
22 conversation around: well, if his name does become
23 public following on from a public statement of the kind
24 that the meeting had been discussed, would the
25 Government be criticised in any way and, if so, what
153
1 for? I said: that, well, the Government would possibly
2 be accused of putting him under pressure to allow the
3 public statement to have been made and there was no
4 further discussion of that point as I recall. I was
5 just registering that point.
6 Q. Can I just ask you one further question in relation to
7 the dossier before I ask you your final question. I am
8 sorry, I missed it this morning. It is CAB/11/77. This
9 is an e-mail from Jonathan Powell to you on
10 17th September which is the same date, at the bottom of
11 the page, that Mr Campbell writes his memo if that helps
12 to orientate you.
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. "The dossier is good and convincing for those who are
15 prepared to be convinced.
16 "I have only three points, none of which affect the
17 way the document is drafted or presented.
18 "First the document does nothing to demonstrate a
19 threat, let alone an imminent threat from Saddam. On
20 other words it shows he has the means but does not
21 demonstrate motive let alone the rest. We will need to
22 make it clear in launching the document that we do not
23 claim that we have evidence that he is an imminent
24 threat. The case we are making is that he has continued
25 to develop WMD since 1998, and is in breach of those
154
1 resolutions."
2 Going back to 77 and up the page, because that is
3 how the e-mails work, you respond saying:
4 "We are now doing a note on Iraq and AQ."
5 Is that Al-Qaida?
6 A. Yes, indeed.
7 Q. "The dossier mentions about eight sites."
8 Then there is an intervention from Felicity Hatfield
9 on behalf of Alastair Campbell.
10 Jonathan Powell, at the top, responds on those other
11 points, but at the bottom of that says:
12 "The threat argument will be a major problem in the
13 press Parliamentary assault after the dossier comes out.
14 We need to flag up in the point in the preface at
15 publication and during the debate. We need to set the
16 test for ourselves at a level we can meet."
17 We have also seen another e-mail in which he said
18 that the dossier ought to make it clear there is no
19 current threat, I think as he put it. Can I take you to
20 his actual words which is CAB/11/53, where he says that
21 in the penultimate paragraph:
22 "You need to make it clear that Saddam could not
23 attack us at the moment. The thesis is he would be
24 a threat to the UK in the future if we do not check
25 him."
155
1 A. Sorry, which?
2 Q. This is the bottom of that page.
3 A. I see. Yes.
4 Q. You do not appear to have been copied into this e-mail?
5 A. No, I was not.
6 Q. Were you aware of these suggestions being made?
7 A. I was not aware of that e-mail and have not seen that
8 before. On the other e-mail, which was either sent to
9 me or was copied to me --
10 Q. And you respond to?
11 A. Yes, and I respond to on the points which I saw as being
12 relevant to me, I did not understand, and I still do not
13 understand, or take that memo to be a request or
14 suggestion to me that the dossier and the text of it
15 should be changed in any way to reflect the point which
16 Jonathan Powell was making. I took it to be a reference
17 to what he thought should be stated in a political
18 statement, which -- whatever political statements were
19 being made in relation to the launching of the dossier.
20 But in any case, even if he had asked for that to be, as
21 it were, put into the dossier, I am not sure I would
22 have seen it as a statement which would have fitted
23 easily into the way that the dossier was construct. But
24 he did not ask so it was not something I pursued.
25 Q. Is there anything else relating to Dr Kelly's death that
156
1 you can assist his Lordship with?
2 A. I do not think there is.
3 Q. And is there anything else that you wanted to say?
4 A. No, there is not.
5 LORD HUTTON: Could we just go back to CAB/11/4? Could we
6 scroll down a bit. Thank you. That is it. Yes.
7 Now, Mr Scarlett, the note there:
8 "If Doctor K name becomes public will Government be
9 criticised for putting him under 'wider pressure'?"
10 You say that is a point that you raised?
11 A. Yes.
12 LORD HUTTON: One might have expected there be some sort of
13 response from someone at the meeting to the effect that
14 we have no option but to put him before the ISC or we
15 may be accused of a cover-up if we do not reveal his
16 name. Do you recollect any comment? One would have
17 thought there would be some sort of response to the
18 point that you made?
19 A. There was not, my Lord, and that may be because it was
20 understood by everybody at the meeting to be the case
21 that Dr Kelly had been warned and was aware of the fact
22 that his name, or rather that the public statement would
23 be made saying that somebody would come forward and that
24 his name was very likely to come out and that he
25 accepted that. So that was part of the underlying
157
1 assumption on I which the discussion was taking place.
2 So I am not sure I find it, even in retrospect,
3 particularly surprising that no comment was made to my
4 point, but as I recall no comment was made.
5 LORD HUTTON: Thank you very much indeed, Mr Scarlett.
6 Thank you. This would be a convenient time to rise,
7 I think.
8 (3.15 pm)
9 (Short Break)
10 (3.20 pm)
11 SIR DAVID OMAND (called)
12 Examined by MR DINGEMANS
13 MR DINGEMANS: Can you give his Lordship your full name.
14 A. David Bruce Omand.
15 Q. What is your occupation?
16 A. I am the Security and Intelligence Coordinator in the
17 Cabinet Office.
18 Q. How long have you held that post for?
19 A. I took up that post last September, on the retirement of
20 Sir Richard Wilson as Cabinet Secretary. I was
21 appointed by the Prime Minister to a new Permanent
22 Secretary post as Security Intelligence Coordinator. In
23 that post I have day-to-day responsibility for a number
24 of the functions traditionally associated with the
25 Cabinet Secretary's post, including accounting to
158
1 Parliament for the Single Intelligence account and
2 acting as line manager for the Chairman of the Joint
3 Intelligence Committee, as you have heard earlier today;
4 and through him, the Cabinet Office assessment staff and
5 security policy division. My major responsibility,
6 however, is overseeing cross-Government work on civil
7 contingencies and counter terrorism, often popularly
8 referred to as "homeland security".
9 Q. Did you have any involvement in the drafting of the
10 dossier?
11 A. As a member of the Joint Intelligence Committee I took
12 my share of collective responsibility in --
13 Q. You were a member of the Joint Intelligence Committee at
14 the time, were you?
15 A. Yes, I had been, in previous jobs, a member of the JIC
16 for a total of some five years. When I took up my new
17 position I decided to rejoin the Committee.
18 Q. Were you a member at the time that the dossier was being
19 drafted from 5th September?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. Were you on the drafting committee of the Joint
22 Intelligence Committee?
23 A. No.
24 Q. I think we have heard that there were meetings of the
25 Joint Intelligence Committee itself on 5th and
159
1 9th September, where assessments were considered in
2 relation to the 45 minutes point, and various drafts of
3 the dossier were produced. Did you have any hand in
4 producing those drafts of the dossiers or reviewing
5 them?
6 A. I was part of that process; I attended those meetings
7 and I did offer comments to John Scarlett on the
8 handling of the dossier.
9 Q. On the handling of the dossier. Were you aware or
10 copied into the e-mails, we have seen some of them, for
11 example from persons in the Communications Department
12 about the dossiers?
13 A. No, but John Scarlett kept me in touch. We meet very
14 regularly and he kept me in touch with his work on the
15 dossier.
16 Q. Right. Did you, for example, see the memorandum that we
17 have seen this morning from Alastair Campbell, dated
18 17th September, and Mr Scarlett's response of
19 18th September?
20 A. Yes, I did see those documents.
21 Q. You saw those. Were you aware of any general
22 unhappiness with the fact that communications personnel
23 were assisting in presentational aspects of the dossier?
24 A. None whatever. And can I say that I do see
25 John Scarlett very frequently; I have complete
160
1 confidence in him and I am sure he would have spoken to
2 me immediately if he had felt there was any unease.
3 Q. Were you aware of any unhappiness lower down the scale,
4 for example within the Defence Intelligence Staff?
5 A. Not at all.
6 LORD HUTTON: Not at -- I beg your pardon?
7 A. Not at all.
8 MR DINGEMANS: Meaning there might have been unhappiness and
9 you were unaware of it or you knew that was going on in
10 the DIS?
11 A. That I was not at all aware of any unhappiness.
12 Q. You were not, for example, having contact with members
13 of the DIS at this stage?
14 A. No. There are three members of the Joint Intelligence
15 Committee from the Ministry of Defence: the Director
16 General for Policy, Chief of Defence Intelligence and
17 the Deputy Chief of Defence Intelligence; and they
18 participated in our debates and discussions in the JIC.
19 At no stage was any unease reported.
20 Can I also add here that we did debate, in the JIC,
21 the decision to produce the dossier. We debated at
22 length how we would protect sources and methods; and
23 I saw it as my particular responsibility to ensure that
24 the whole exercise was conducted in a way that did not
25 endanger our intelligence.
161
1 Q. There had been press reports there were rows between
2 yourself and Mr Campbell; are those reports true?
3 A. No.
4 Q. And that there were rows between a Mr Lander and
5 Mr Campbell; are those reports true?
6 A. To the best of my knowledge, no.
7 Q. You certainly did not see any?
8 A. No.
9 Q. And Mr Scarlett and Mr Campbell; you were not aware of
10 any rows?
11 A. No, and I certainly would have been aware if there had
12 been any disagreement over the handling of the dossier.
13 Q. You have seen, I think, because you were here earlier
14 on, the conclusion that the FAC came to about the fact
15 that the dossier should have been in more traditional
16 language, as they expressed it. First of all, do you
17 accept that the dossier was not in "traditional",
18 whatever that might mean, intelligence language?
19 A. No, I do not accept that. I think the dossier was
20 a faithful reflection of the underlying intelligence
21 assessments that the JIC had reached; and very great
22 care was taken, throughout the process, to ensure that
23 that was the case.
24 Q. We have seen an e-mail today, CAB/23/15. That e-mail
25 is -- I think we were told by Mr Scarlett -- from
162
1 someone on the Joint Intelligence Committee back to, as
2 it were, the agencies. It says:
3 "Unsurprisingly they [as in No. 10] have further
4 questions and areas they would like expanded."
5 Towards the bottom of the e-mail:
6 "I appreciate everyone, us included, has been around
7 at least some of these buoys before, particularly
8 item 4. But No. 10 through the Chairman want the
9 document to be a strong as possible within the bounds of
10 available intelligence. This is therefore a last (!)
11 call for any items of intelligence that agencies think
12 can and should be included."
13 Were you aware of the e-mail at the time?
14 A. No.
15 Q. It gives the impression that there is a bit of a sort of
16 looking into cupboards to see if there is anything that
17 has been overlooked that might be put in the dossier.
18 Would that be a fair assessment of the e-mail?
19 A. I think you have to remember the Joint Intelligence
20 Committee itself was anxious to produce as strong
21 a document as possible, consistent with the protection
22 of intelligence sources and methods.
23 Q. Were you party to the final meeting of the Joint
24 Intelligence Committee that signed off the dossier?
25 A. Yes.
163
1 Q. And everyone assented to that?
2 A. Yes, they did.
3 Q. Turning on to February 2003, we have heard that
4 Mr Gilligan comes by a document, a secret document,
5 relating to the links between or absence of links
6 between Al-Qaida and Saddam Hussein. I think we have
7 also heard that that did not come to Mr Gilligan from
8 Dr Kelly, from Mr Gilligan's evidence. Were you aware
9 of that leak?
10 A. Yes, and I was concerned by it.
11 Q. Were any steps taken?
12 A. I discussed with Sir Kevin Tebbit, the Permanent
13 Secretary at the Ministry of Defence, the possibility
14 that there could be a source of compromise of classified
15 information within the Ministry of Defence, and he
16 reassured me that he too was taking steps to investigate
17 whether that might be the case.
18 Q. And forwarding on then to 29th May, we have the
19 broadcast by Mr Gilligan on Today. Did you in fact hear
20 the broadcast?
21 A. Yes, I did.
22 Q. And your reaction to it?
23 A. Extreme surprise.
24 Q. Were you party to any action as a result of that?
25 A. No, although I did raise it with my office when I came
164
1 in about 8 o'clock that morning to check that something
2 was being done and that the story would be responded to;
3 and as far as I know the answer to that was: yes, it was
4 being handled by the No. 10 press office.
5 Q. We have seen documents with Mr Scarlett of 4th June
6 about a leak inquiry and some reports up to you on
7 10th June and your memos, and there is a final analysis
8 on 9th July. If it is all right with you I will not
9 take you through those documents.
10 A. It is.
11 Q. But those suggest that attempts were being made to
12 identify the source of the leak; is that right?
13 A. That is correct. It was difficult to pin down where
14 this source or sources of compromise might be; and,
15 therefore, it did not seem justifiable to launch
16 a formal leak investigation, which involves the
17 appointment of an outside investigator who would then
18 conduct an extensive series of interviews with all those
19 who would have seen the relevant documents, not knowing
20 where to start. That meant we had to try to narrow the
21 field down, which is why we asked the security policy
22 division to see if they could undertake a preliminary
23 investigation.
24 Q. We have seen the results of that. Did you hear of
25 Dr Kelly's name at all during June?
165
1 A. No.
2 Q. Before your first involvement in July, had you heard of
3 Dr Kelly before?
4 A. I had not.
5 Q. What was your involvement in relation to Dr Kelly?
6 A. When I was telephoned about 5.30 on the Friday,
7 4th July, by Sir Kevin Tebbit, who informed me that an
8 individual, Dr Kelly, had come forward.
9 Q. What discussion did you have with anyone as a result of
10 that?
11 A. I discussed the situation with Kevin Tebbit. He told me
12 he was going to write to me and seek my involvement, my
13 help, in ensuring the matter was handled properly and
14 that there was proper interdepartmental coordination of
15 what clearly could be a difficult case to handle.
16 I agreed to this; and he said he would write to me.
17 I then spoke to John Scarlett, as you have heard, and
18 asked him if he knew of Dr Kelly and if Dr Kelly had
19 been involved in the drawing up of the dossier, since
20 that clearly would be an important pointer as to whether
21 or not this could be the source of the stories.
22 Q. So you raised, on that Friday, the issue of whether or
23 not Dr Kelly had actually been involved with drawing up
24 the dossier?
25 A. Yes, and I was assured by John Scarlett that he had not
166
1 been part of John Scarlett's central assessment team's
2 work.
3 Q. He was not a member of the Joint Intelligence Committee
4 or indeed the Assessment Committee for the Joint
5 Intelligence Committee.
6 A. Correct.
7 Q. Were any steps made to find out what involvement, if
8 any, he had had with the final drafts of the dossier?
9 A. At that stage, no. My assumption was that that would
10 indeed happen.
11 Q. Your assumption was that that would happen?
12 A. Yes, that this would be checked up on as part of the
13 Ministry of Defence's investigation of Dr Kelly's
14 involvement.
15 Q. Right. So you did not raise it expressly.
16 A. No.
17 Q. You assumed it would just be dealt with.
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. We have then heard you go over to No. 10, and there is
20 a meeting at which you are joined by Mr Powell and
21 Sir David Manning; is that right?
22 A. Yes. I suggested to John Scarlett that we should try to
23 speak to Sir David Manning as soon as possible, since he
24 was involved in the coordination of work on the Foreign
25 Affairs Committee inquiry which was due to report on the
167
1 Monday, and recall that I had been telephoned at 5.30 on
2 a Friday afternoon and the report was due out on the
3 Monday. So there was very little time if anything was
4 to be done in respect of that publication.
5 LORD HUTTON: I have asked at least one other witness,
6 Sir David, as to the reason why these very senior
7 officials, including yourself, all assembled to discuss
8 this report with Sir Kevin Tebbit. I mean, it does seem
9 a galaxy gathering to discuss this matter, if I may so
10 put it. Do you have any comment on that?
11 A. I think the explanation lies in the front pages of the
12 newspapers, that this was an issue which had dominated
13 political debate in the country for a considerable time
14 and showed no signs of diminishing. It was a matter of
15 intense interest and concern to the Prime Minister, in
16 view of the nature of the allegations which were being
17 made. It was a matter of concern to me, because it was
18 directly challenging the integrity of a process for
19 which I was responsible.
20 LORD HUTTON: Yes. Thank you.
21 MR DINGEMANS: Was anything decided on 4th July?
22 A. Friday, 4th? We discussed, at the meeting, the
23 likelihood of Dr Kelly being the single source to which
24 Mr Gilligan had referred.
25 We came to the conclusion that we did not have
168
1 enough information, at that stage, to take any action,
2 and that that would be our recommendation. This
3 followed the advice from Sir Kevin Tebbit, particularly
4 in view of the discrepancies which they had noted
5 between Dr Kelly's account and the account given by
6 Mr Gilligan. We could not be certain that Dr Kelly was,
7 indeed, responsible for this story.
8 Q. So why was that not the end of the matter?
9 A. Simply because if it turned out, on further
10 investigation, that there was more behind this, then it
11 could represent an explanation of the story which, as
12 I have said, had been dominating political debate in the
13 country.
14 Q. So what was decided to be done on that Friday evening?
15 A. To seek more information. Firstly, to await the arrival
16 of Kevin Tebbit's letter to see exactly what terms he
17 was reporting this in to us and to urge the Ministry of
18 Defence to see if they could clarify the inconsistencies
19 which Kevin Tebbit had told me of but only in the most
20 general terms.
21 Q. Did you see Sir Kevin Tebbit's letter of 4th July to you
22 that evening?
23 A. Yes, I did.
24 Q. I think we see it at MoD/1/34. You have heard my
25 questioning of Mr Scarlett, so I need not go to the
169
1 relevant passages, but in that letter it is made
2 perfectly clear that Dr Kelly is saying that he did not
3 say anything about the 45 minutes or anything material
4 about the 45 minutes to Mr Gilligan; in particular, he
5 had not said that the information was single source and
6 he had not said that it was added late.
7 Were you aware of that on 4th July?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. What did you think of those, as it were, denials by
10 Dr Kelly?
11 A. My thought was that there were a number of
12 possibilities: that Dr Kelly might not have been, on
13 this first interview, revealing all that he could say on
14 the matter, for quite understandable reasons; or that he
15 was genuinely coming forward to help the Ministry clear
16 up a misunderstanding, and that he had been seriously
17 misrepresented in the reporting. There was, therefore,
18 more than one possibility; and at that stage we really
19 could not be certain what the situation actually was.
20 Therefore, my recommendation to the meeting was that we
21 should take no action in respect of the Foreign Affairs
22 Committee, although their report was due imminently on
23 the Monday.
24 I was, at the same time, anxious that the group of
25 officials, senior officials as Lord Hutton has referred
170
1 to us, should properly consider the point about the
2 Foreign Affairs Committee because we would be placed in
3 a very false position if we had sat on information which
4 was very relevant to a report by a Parliamentary Select
5 Committee, which was imminent.
6 LORD HUTTON: Sir David, I think it may be obvious again but
7 I would just like to ask you: when you say that Dr Kelly
8 may not have revealed all "for understandable reasons",
9 would you be good enough to spell out what those
10 understandable reasons are? It may well be obvious but
11 I think it would be helpful if you would state them.
12 A. That Dr Kelly may have come forward in a genuine wish to
13 clear matters up but he had minimised his participation
14 in the meeting with Mr Gilligan in order to protect
15 himself from any action by the Ministry of Defence.
16 LORD HUTTON: Yes. Thank you.
17 MR DINGEMANS: You say there that one of the concerns was
18 not to be in a false position of not cooperating, as it
19 were, fully with a Parliamentary Committee. But is it
20 not right that the Foreign Affairs Committee had
21 actually asked for drafts of the dossiers as a way of
22 sorting out this dispute between Mr Gilligan and
23 Mr Campbell and they had not been provided?
24 A. I think I would put the point the other way round, that
25 the Foreign Affairs Committee was already, as they
171
1 eventually recorded in their report, annoyed with the
2 Government at not, as they saw it, fully cooperating.
3 For them to have discovered we had been sitting on
4 relevant information would have compounded the events.
5 Q. Why were not copies of the earlier drafts of the dossier
6 disclosed? I mean, that would have assisted in making
7 the points that you make about the dossier.
8 A. For the reasons that Mr Scarlett has explained, that the
9 process -- the close examination of the process of
10 putting together the dossier would reveal more about the
11 nature of the intelligence underlying the assessments
12 than we thought would be safe.
13 Q. Is that how it ends on 4th July, with you having
14 received a copy of Sir Kevin Tebbit's letter?
15 A. Yes. Having had the discussion, Jonathan Powell having
16 said he would mention this to the Prime Minister, he
17 then rang me back to say he had mentioned it to the
18 Prime Minister and the Prime Minister agreed with our
19 assessment that no action should be taken until we had
20 further information about what exactly all this was
21 about. I relayed that back to Kevin Tebbit by
22 telephone.
23 Q. Then what happens on 5th July?
24 A. On 5th July I receive a second letter from Kevin Tebbit.
25 Q. Yes. We have seen that. It picks up an article by
172
1 Mr Baldwin in The Times on 5th July.
2 A. That is right. And I speak to Kevin Tebbit more than
3 once on the Saturday to discuss whether this sheds more
4 light on the possibility of it being the source. We
5 agreed that prima facie it does that but there remain
6 these inconsistencies.
7 Sir Kevin drew to my attention the fact that
8 Richard Hatfield, the personnel director, believed, on
9 the basis of the first interview, that Dr Kelly was not
10 the single source and therefore we were proceeding with
11 some caution on the matter.
12 The other event on the Saturday was that I was rung
13 by the resident Duty Clerk at the Foreign Office, who
14 passed on a message from the Foreign Secretary that in
15 his view we did not have enough information, at the
16 moment, to warrant informing the Foreign Affairs
17 Committee.
18 Q. Did you have any contact with anyone on the Sunday?
19 A. Yes. I spoke to Sir Kevin Tebbit again; and I was rung
20 by the Prime Minister, who was at Chequers.
21 Q. And he rang you in the morning or in the afternoon?
22 A. In the morning, about 11.30.
23 Q. What did you discuss with the Prime Minister?
24 A. I updated him on the basis of my conversations with
25 Kevin Tebbit and on the basis of the second letter. We
173
1 discussed the options for informing the Foreign Affairs
2 Committee, which effectively -- and you have had this
3 confirmed, I think, by the Chairman of the Foreign
4 Affairs Committee -- might well have meant their
5 postponing the publication of their report. We
6 discussed whether we knew enough to be certain to
7 trigger such an action. And my advice, which the
8 Prime Minister endorsed, was that we should follow the
9 recommendation of the Ministry of Defence and await
10 further information from the reinterview of Dr Kelly.
11 Q. So it is decided, or provisionally decided, over the
12 weekend that Dr Kelly should be reinterviewed; is that
13 right?
14 A. Yes. The Ministry of Defence were intending to do that.
15 I discussed it with Kevin Tebbit. I made sure that the
16 Prime Minister was aware of that and that he agreed this
17 was a sensible course to follow.
18 Q. We have seen a note that you prepared on 21st July, so
19 it is after the event but obviously closer to it. It is
20 CAB/11/5, at the top from Sir David Omand, dated
21 21st July 2003. Going down to the bottom there is
22 a review of the weekend decision not to inform the FAC
23 before the publication of the report that Dr Kelly had
24 come forward:
25 "There was some questioning from the PM about what
174
1 we knew about Dr Kelly, and whether we could find out
2 more about his views."
3 It looks as if that is the only reference to the
4 weekend discussions before you turn to 7th July; is that
5 right?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. Was anything else said or did anything else happen on
8 the weekend that is relevant to this Inquiry?
9 A. Not that I recall.
10 Q. I think you write a letter to Sir Kevin Tebbit at
11 MoD/1/42. It appears to be dated 5th July. No doubt
12 you can confirm that is just a typo in the top?
13 A. It was typed on my laptop at home, which automatically
14 inserts a date. The letter was started on the Saturday
15 but I reopened it and finished it on the Sunday without
16 correcting the date.
17 Q. Right. so you started on the Saturday, finished off on
18 the Sunday, and that is your response to
19 Sir Kevin Tebbit.
20 That brings us up to the Monday morning, is that
21 right?
22 A. That is correct.
23 Q. What happens on the Monday morning?
24 A. On the Monday morning, the -- where are we? (Pause).
25 Q. Do you have a meeting with anyone?
175
1 A. Yes, I just -- if you will excuse me -- want to get my
2 thoughts in order.
3 LORD HUTTON: Certainly. Take whatever time you wish,
4 Sir David.
5 A. The first thing on the morning of the 7th was the
6 receipt of the message from John Scarlett, to which
7 I think you have already referred.
8 MR DINGEMANS: Yes.
9 A. Giving John's assessment. I had conducted a parallel
10 assessment over the weekend for my own purpose, looking
11 at the statements which had been made and trying to
12 compare those, and had reached more or less the same
13 conclusion as John Scarlett.
14 Q. That?
15 A. That there was a prima facie case for believing this was
16 the single source and that reinterview was the next
17 step.
18 Can I also add, my interpretation -- I did not
19 discuss this with John Scarlett -- of what was meant by
20 a "security style interview" is the kind of interview
21 you are giving me, that is carefully prepared,
22 determined to get to the truth, and courteous.
23 Q. That is very kind of you.
24 We have seen the note that Mr Scarlett made, and
25 that is CAB/1/46. Did you produce any similar note?
176
1 A. You have referred to the record that I made, which was
2 after the event of the meetings that followed.
3 Q. Yes, but no contemporaneous note?
4 A. No contemporaneous note, no.
5 Q. Is this fair: your provisional view on 7th July is that
6 Dr Kelly is likely to be Mr Gilligan's single source?
7 A. Likely to be, but still with a considerable uncertainty
8 about the inconsistencies. Now, my hunch was that
9 a further reinterview would be able to explain away some
10 of those inconsistencies, such as how long Mr Gilligan
11 had known Dr Kelly, if he was the source, and other
12 matters; that it would be possible to clear those up.
13 But at this stage I could not be certain about that.
14 Q. But one major inconsistency must have been Dr Kelly
15 saying, "I am not the single source", you thinking it at
16 least likely that he was, and Mr Gilligan reporting for
17 the first time two pieces of information that were not
18 in the public domain, namely single sourcing and late
19 addition of the 45 minutes claim. That was obviously
20 crucial, was it not, to chase down?
21 A. Indeed, although, as I think you have already heard this
22 afternoon, it is perfectly possible, given the
23 timescales involved, that Dr Kelly, who had close
24 contacts with members of the Defence Intelligence Staff,
25 could well have picked up the points about the
177
1 45 minutes.
2 Q. So that is a possibility. The other possibility is he
3 actually knew anyway because he was involved in the
4 drafting of the dossier or making suggestions.
5 A. At that stage I did not think that. I was not aware of
6 that being the case.
7 Q. No-one is, as far as you know, chasing it down, you just
8 assumed that the Ministry of Defence are likely to do
9 that?
10 A. No, my assumption indeed was what I have referred to as
11 the security style interview would, indeed, proceed on
12 the basis of careful preparation of the ground
13 beforehand by those conducting the interview, in
14 particular Mr Martin Howard, who was directly involved
15 in the intelligence side of this; and it is -- that was
16 the basis on which I was operating.
17 Q. CAB/11/6 is part of the memo that I have shown you,
18 produced on 21st July. At the top you are talking about
19 the meeting on 7th July, that Dr Kelly's account ought
20 to be subject to more forensic examination. You say
21 that the MoD ought to consider reinterviewing him. That
22 is the meeting:
23 "Kevin Tebbit said that the MoD were considering
24 calling him back ... He reiterated that Dr Kelly had
25 come forward of his own volition, and that as far as MoD
178
1 was concerned there was no question of any offence
2 having been committed under the Official Secrets Act.
3 Dr Kelly's continued cooperation was therefore
4 essential. The Prime Minister made it clear that the
5 MoD should continue to handle the case properly, and
6 should follow whatever internal procedures were normal
7 in such cases."
8 Was that your understanding at the time, that
9 Dr Kelly's continued cooperation was essential?
10 A. Yes, because my understanding was that he was not under
11 suspicion of having committed an offence under the
12 Official Secrets Act and therefore that would not
13 involve a formal investigation by the police. Nor was
14 he facing formal disciplinary processes. It was,
15 therefore, on the basis of his having volunteered
16 himself, having come forward, that we were proceeding;
17 and the Ministry of Defence, as his employer, owed him
18 a duty of care. This was a point that was also made and
19 I have recorded, or is recorded in one of the notes,
20 a point by the Foreign Secretary about the employment
21 rights of Dr Kelly.
22 LORD HUTTON: When you refer to a duty of care, do you mean
23 in the general sense of the term to look after his
24 welfare in general terms, or more protection of specific
25 contractual rights he might have, Sir David?
179
1 A. I refer to the general duty of the employer towards the
2 employee.
3 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
4 A. And that this was an individual who had come forward to
5 help the Ministry and had volunteered himself. This was
6 not an individual who the Ministry of Defence were
7 pursuing --
8 LORD HUTTON: Quite, yes.
9 A. -- for a specific disciplinary offence.
10 MR DINGEMANS: No. In fact, we have seen -- I imagine you
11 saw at some stage -- Mr Hatfield's note of 4th July
12 where effectively he got a telling off and was told he
13 was going to get a formal letter about it.
14 Now, in relation to that, did you understand whether
15 or not Dr Kelly was happy with the possibility that his
16 name would be made public?
17 A. All I knew of that was that I had been told by
18 Kevin Tebbit that Dr Kelly had been warned that his --
19 he might well have to appear before -- to give evidence
20 before a Committee and his name might well become
21 public.
22 Q. Plainly if you go and give evidence before a committee,
23 especially a public committee, your name is likely to
24 become public. Is that all you were told about his
25 consent to the fact his name might become public?
180
1 A. I do not recall a specific reference to his consent.
2 When we came -- if I may jump ahead for a second -- to
3 the meeting on the Tuesday which I attended in No. 10,
4 the conclusions that were reached there were conclusions
5 ad referendum to the Ministry of Defence, who had the
6 lead, and to their checking with Dr Kelly he would be
7 prepared to cooperate and give evidence and indeed agree
8 a statement which would be -- a letter which would be
9 written, as it was then supposed, by myself to the
10 Intelligence and Security Committee.
11 So all this referring again back to the point
12 I referred to about his cooperation being essential.
13 Q. Were you told of the results of the second interview
14 that Dr Kelly had on 7th July?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. Who told you that?
17 A. I believe that was -- my memory is that was relayed to
18 me initially by my private secretary, who had heard it,
19 I believe, from John Scarlett. I subsequently spoke to
20 Sir Kevin Tebbit.
21 Q. Right. And what was the outcome, as you understood it,
22 of the second interview?
23 A. A significant increase in the probability that Dr Kelly
24 was the single source, because of the acceptance by
25 Dr Kelly that he might have gone rather further in his
181
1 discussions than he had indicated at his first
2 interview, coupled with the fact that we had, by then,
3 done further analysis of the whole matter and had begun
4 to think through why it would be that the BBC would
5 still be insisting on there being a single source, if in
6 fact there was more than one source they could have
7 brought to bear to corroborate their story.
8 So it was all beginning to come together. But there
9 was still uncertainty; and the Ministry of Defence
10 continued to stress that they could not be certain that
11 he was the single source. I continued in the meetings
12 at No. 10 to make sure that point was represented.
13 Q. But if you think he is the single source, then he is
14 likely to be the person who told Mr Gilligan that the
15 45 minutes was added late and that it was single
16 sourced. Did that concern you, at this stage?
17 A. Likely to be, but not certain.
18 Q. I appreciate that. But obviously we have seen the
19 letters, I mean between Mr Campbell and the BBC. And
20 one of the points the BBC kept on making was: well, the
21 person was right about the 45 minutes added late and
22 single sourced. Was any sort of chasing down done of
23 this particular point, at this stage?
24 A. At that stage, I am not aware that it was.
25 Q. That brings us from 7th July. At this stage, have you
182
1 seen any draft press statements or defensive Q and A
2 material?
3 A. No.
4 Q. On 8th July, do you have any further meetings in
5 relation to this matter?
6 A. Yes. I was called to a further meeting in the
7 Prime Minister's study at about 11.45 on 8th July.
8 Q. So after the Prime Minister has been to the
9 Liaison Committee you are then at the meeting
10 afterwards; is that right?
11 A. That is right.
12 Q. There is a discussion about Dr Kelly, is there?
13 A. There is.
14 Q. And what is said here?
15 A. Well, we were informed that Sir Kevin Tebbit had not
16 been able to get to the meeting but that he would be
17 returning to London as soon as possible. In his
18 absence, I gave an account of what we believed to be the
19 conclusions of the reinterview and the views, in
20 particular, of Martin Howard, who had been present at
21 that reinterview.
22 Q. Did you express any views about the FAC or not, at that
23 stage?
24 A. Yes, we discussed what should be done. I made clear my
25 view, which was that there was now sufficient
183
1 probability that he was the single source to warrant our
2 informing the Parliamentary Committees; and that, in
3 particular, the Intelligence and Security Committee
4 needed to know they were about to take evidence from
5 senior witnesses on these very matters, and we could not
6 be in a false position of appearing before a Committee
7 and not admitting to the fact that we now believed that
8 it was likely we had an explanation for the stories that
9 had appeared.
10 Q. What was said about the Foreign Affairs Committee?
11 A. As far as I can recall the logic of the discussion, we
12 first considered the position of the Intelligence and
13 Security Committee and agreed that we had to inform
14 them. And certainly I made it clear that if I was
15 giving evidence I would certainly have to admit to this
16 knowledge; and that it would be very difficult, indeed
17 unthinkable, to inform one Committee, the Intelligence
18 and Security Committee, and not inform the Foreign
19 Affairs Committee, which is a Select Committee of
20 Parliament, who had only just completed a report which
21 touched on these matters; so that if we informed one we
22 would have to inform the other. The logic then went on
23 to debate: if we inform the Foreign Affairs Committee,
24 is that tantamount to making the matter public? And we
25 concluded that it was.
184
1 Q. Had not the Foreign Secretary given evidence in private
2 to the Foreign Affairs Committee?
3 A. Yes, he had.
4 Q. The Foreign Affairs Committee had reported, had they
5 not?
6 A. They had.
7 Q. And you were, as a Government, cooperating with the
8 Intelligence and Security Committee in giving them
9 drafts of the dossier, and you were less than
10 cooperative to the Foreign Affairs Committee, you were
11 not giving them any drafts of the dossier. Why did you
12 need to tell them anything?
13 A. (Pause). The answer to that, I think, you have already
14 had this morning from a member of the Committee and
15 indeed from the Chairman of the Committee. For us to
16 have deliberately withheld this information from
17 a Select Committee, when it was relevant to a report
18 they had just produced, whilst making it available to
19 another Committee of Parliamentarians would have been,
20 in my view, improper.
21 Q. Was any thought given to notifying the Foreign Affairs
22 Committee in private?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. I mean, like Mr Straw's evidence.
25 A. The evidence may have been given in private, but the
185
1 fact that he was giving it certainly was not. That was
2 very publicly known. And we thought it just
3 inconceivable that we could inform the Chairman and the
4 Chairman would not feel obliged to inform the Committee;
5 and once we had told the Foreign Affairs Committee in
6 full, that was tantamount to making the matter public.
7 Q. We have seen, in some of the documents, a proposal that
8 the Intelligence and Security Committee should hear this
9 evidence in public, Dr Kelly's evidence in public; and
10 we know, from memos that Mr Scarlett has written, that
11 he was very against that view, for perfectly
12 understandable reasons. Why was anyone thinking that
13 the Intelligence and Security Committee should hear this
14 evidence in public?
15 A. I cannot explain that. I find it a bizarre suggestion.
16 Q. You see, one explanation may be, this may be entirely
17 wrong, that the Government wanted the name out.
18 A. Well, at the meeting on Tuesday with the Prime Minister
19 the conclusion we reached was that we should try to
20 inform Parliament, particularly the Parliamentarians who
21 composed the ISC, of the fact that an individual had
22 come forward but that we should, most definitely, not
23 reveal the name of the individual. There was still
24 sufficient doubt in our minds as to whether we had got
25 fully to the bottom of the story to make it prudent to
186
1 protect Dr Kelly at that stage from the exposure of his
2 name.
3 Q. So on Tuesday morning everyone is concerned that
4 Dr Kelly's name should be, so far as possible, kept
5 private?
6 A. The suggestion, which I believe I may have originated at
7 the meeting, that I write to the Chairman of the
8 Intelligence and Security Committee informing her of the
9 fact of an individual having come forward and making it
10 clear that we would -- this, of course, was subject to
11 the Ministry of Defence and Dr Kelly agreeing to this --
12 make that individual available to give evidence. That
13 was on the understanding that Dr Kelly's name would be
14 provided privately to the ISC, and I had every
15 confidence that the ISC would protect that confidence
16 and that his name would be protected. And that was
17 accepted by the Prime Minister.
18 LORD HUTTON: Yes. May I just ask you, Sir David: is it
19 reasonable to draw the inference from your most recent
20 answers that you were protecting Dr Kelly and seeking
21 that his name would not become public whilst you were
22 uncertain whether or not he was Mr Gilligan's single
23 source, but that if it became quite clear that he was
24 the single source then there would not be the same need
25 to protect his name and to prevent it from becoming
187
1 public?
2 A. I think that is a very fair summing-up of the point
3 I was trying to get over.
4 LORD HUTTON: I think you were making it quite clear.
5 I just wanted to be clear in my own mind.
6 A. It was our assumption, Kevin Tebbit's assumption and my
7 assumption, that all this would become public in due
8 course. That Dr Kelly's name, if he was the source,
9 would have to become public; such was the degree of
10 public concern and press interest, that this would
11 inevitably come out, and there was no reason for it not
12 to come out. What we were anxious to do was to make
13 sure that we were on the right track, and the
14 Intelligence and Security Committee, through their
15 inquiry, which is -- and their inquiries they have
16 conducted in private and in a calm and deliberative way,
17 that their inquiries would be likely to lead to a
18 conclusion which could then be made public; and that
19 could be done in an orderly and measured way.
20 I have to say, that although was the course that we
21 agreed should be recommended to the Ministry of Defence,
22 this was at the meeting on Tuesday, the Prime Minister
23 did say to me that he had some doubts as to whether the
24 Foreign Affairs Committee, when they heard, would not
25 insist on seeing Dr Kelly, and that in those
188
1 circumstances it would be very difficult to refuse; and
2 so that risk was noted and accepted.
3 LORD HUTTON: May I then ask you this: you said just
4 a moment or two ago that there was no reason why
5 Dr Kelly's name should not come out. I think that was
6 on the basis that it was clear that he was Mr Gilligan's
7 single source. May I just ask you why is it your view
8 that there was no reason why the name should not come
9 out? I appreciate you have already explained the great
10 public interest in the matter and your discussions were
11 proceeding on the basis that Dr Kelly had been warned
12 that he might well have to appear before a Committee.
13 Is there anything else you would like to add on that
14 point?
15 A. Only that if it turned out to be the case that he had --
16 he was the explanation for this story, and this had
17 arisen because of an unauthorised contact he had made
18 with the press, then there would indeed be an obligation
19 on him to help clear up the matter --
20 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
21 A. -- given the very intense public interest and the fact
22 that very great damage had been done to the credibility
23 of the Government and credibility of Government
24 institutions as a result of this whole furore.
25 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
189
1 A. So I could see that he would indeed need -- and the
2 press would insist on knowing who the individual was.
3 LORD HUTTON: I quite appreciate that it may well be that
4 the answer may well be obvious, but where would the duty
5 of care of the Ministry of Defence to its employee have
6 stood in that position? I think in a sense you have
7 already answered that but I would just like to be quite
8 clear.
9 A. The continuing duty of care to make sure that an
10 individual who is in a difficult position is properly
11 supported and looked after, is not put under undue
12 pressures and is given all the help and support
13 necessary, as would be the case in any disciplinary or
14 related matter where an individual has committed some
15 offence or made some error which has to be publicly
16 acknowledged.
17 LORD HUTTON: Yes, I see. Thank you.
18 MR DINGEMANS: You have told us that in the morning of
19 8th July the aim is to give his name privately to the
20 Intelligence and Security Committee, and a copy of the
21 letter to the FAC. That may or may not lead to further
22 developments.
23 A. Can I just stop you there and say that as part of that
24 proposal the letter would be itself made public. So the
25 fact of an individual coming forward would be made known
190
1 publicly through the release of the letter. That was
2 the plan because of, as I have said, our assumption that
3 it was -- it would become public knowledge anyway once
4 we had told the Foreign Affairs Committee. It was
5 better, therefore, that it was done openly and in words
6 over which we had control in the form of the letter to
7 the Chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee.
8 Q. Is the correspondence to the Intelligence and Security
9 Committee normally made public?
10 A. No, this indeed would be an unusual step.
11 Q. Because in the morning everyone is not sure he is the
12 source. If he is not the source there is an assumption
13 he should be kept out of the press, as it were; and yet
14 by the evening we have the press statement being made in
15 the terms that we have seen it being made and the
16 defensive Q and A material being drafted. What led to
17 the change in approach?
18 A. Well, there are a number of steps that I need to
19 explain. When the meeting which started at 11.30
20 concluded, it was on the basis that the Ministry of
21 Defence would be consulted, through Kevin Tebbit, who
22 was on his way back from Portsmouth -- would be
23 consulted about a letter I would write to the Chair of
24 the Intelligence and Security Committee, that letter
25 being copied to the Foreign Affairs Committee and made
191
1 public, notifying them of the fact that an individual
2 had come forward and making it clear, subject, as I have
3 said, to Dr Kelly's assent to this, that the individual
4 was available for interview by the Intelligence and
5 Security Committee.
6 So that was the proposal which was arrived at, at
7 that meeting.
8 Q. Did that work, in practice?
9 A. It did not work.
10 Q. Why did it not work?
11 A. As I left the meeting, I went straight to speak to the
12 Clerk to the Intelligence and Security Committee to warn
13 him that this was likely to take place, so that he could
14 inform the Chairman as a courtesy. I was on my way to
15 Ottawa on an official visit and had very little time.
16 Q. When were you going to fly?
17 A. I had to leave the building around 12.30.
18 Q. On the 8th July?
19 A. Yes. And it was already around 12.30. I spoke to the
20 Clerk and passed on this message. The Clerk expressed
21 some reservation to me about whether the Committee would
22 welcome a public letter of that nature.
23 Q. What was the nature of the reservation?
24 A. Largely along the lines that the work of the Committee
25 is conducted in private, this would be to appear to
192
1 dictate to the Committee who they should see and that
2 the Committee did not give running commentaries on who
3 they were seeing and when they were seeing them, and
4 therefore this would be an unwelcome break with
5 precedent as far as they were concerned.
6 This was confirmed, and I heard this by telephone as
7 I went to Heathrow, as the view of the Chair shortly
8 afterwards; but it was the view of the -- of Ann Taylor,
9 the Chair of the Committee, that the Committee would
10 accept reference, in a public statement by the
11 Government, to the Intelligence and Security Committee
12 being prepared to interview the individual concerned;
13 and that reference duly appeared in the public statement
14 that was made.
15 So that really explains how we switched, in the
16 course of the early afternoon, from a plan which was
17 based on an open letter to the Intelligence and Security
18 Committee to a press statement. The conclusion reached
19 in discussion with the Ministry of Defence had been that
20 I would write the letter to the Intelligence and
21 Security Committee, since I am responsible for the
22 Government relationship with that Committee. When it
23 turned then to a question of a public statement, it
24 seemed appropriate for that to be made by the Ministry
25 of Defence and not by the Cabinet Office.
193
1 Q. So if the original concern is this: the Intelligence and
2 Security Committee ought to be told, you tell them, they
3 say, "Well, actually we do not want to be told, looks
4 like you are running our agenda", why is there any need
5 for a public statement?
6 A. Well, I think the message was that they do not want to
7 be told in that form, but they would be prepared to
8 accept a reference in a public statement; and the
9 information I -- that we were giving them, that an
10 individual had come forward, was highly relevant to them
11 and indeed as subsequently, in the event, they did
12 indeed take evidence from Dr Kelly.
13 Q. I appreciate you get on the plane and disappear to
14 Ottawa. Can I just complete this? That is the end of
15 your actual involvement with matters as they stood?
16 A. That is right. I did authorise my private secretary to
17 write to Ann Taylor with Dr Kelly's name.
18 Q. Which is a letter which is on the record?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. But can I take you to CAB/1/86? This is on 9th July in
21 the morning from Sandra Powell on behalf of
22 Alastair Campbell to Clare Sumner:
23 "... wondering whether in the light of yesterday's
24 developments [that is the press statement, no doubt, the
25 Ministry of Defence release] there is not a case for me
194
1 doing more with the ISC than the half hour with a
2 limited focus on intelligence handling. If the BBC
3 source situation develops as it might, surely it is in
4 our interest for the ISC to delve deeply into this, by
5 interviewing the source, and Gilligan and myself, and
6 for us all putting over our concerns about the damage
7 this could do to the integrity of the Intelligence
8 Services."
9 One possible reading may be that this was a plan, as
10 it were, to arrange the ISC to get them involved in some
11 way in the dispute between Mr Campbell and the BBC?
12 A. I had not seen this e-mail before. That would not be my
13 reading of it. I think you have to recall that the
14 Intelligence and Security Committee had said in their
15 annual report, which had been published, that they
16 intended to examine in more detail the intelligence and
17 assessments available and their use, and that they would
18 report when those enquiries were completed. That was
19 the inquiry the ISC were then launching upon. I saw
20 that as part of their statutory function from the 1994
21 Intelligence Services Act in overseeing the work of the
22 agencies, in particular allegations over the misuse of
23 the intelligence. So all this was highly germane to the
24 review being -- inquiry being conducted by the ISC. And
25 therefore it was indeed in everyone's interest that the
195
1 ISC should try to get to the bottom of it.
2 Q. Can I take you to another e-mail? It is CAB/1/87, the
3 next page. I appreciate you are at the moment in
4 Ottawa. It just goes to whether the ISC really did want
5 to become involved. You see it is 9th July and towards
6 evening, 17.55, from Clare Sumner to Alastair Campbell:
7 "I have confirmed that you will appear from 8.30 to
8 9.45 on 17 July and will have to leave promptly.
9 "I asked where they were with other interviews.
10 "The ISC Clerk told me that the Committee were not
11 interested in interviewing Andrew G as he could not say
12 anything more to them than the FAC.
13 "He said that on the source they were waiting for
14 David Omand to write to them with the correspondence.
15 He implied that he did not believe it was the source so
16 could not see the point of the ISC seeing him and said
17 they were not interested in the BBC/AC row. The fact he
18 rested this on was that AG said that he had known this
19 source for years whereas the MoD said months. I think
20 this point could be clarified in the letter from DO to
21 the ISC. I pointed out that the BBC had not denied he
22 was the source."
23 What it looks like is that it is the Government that
24 is very keen to get the ISC and the FAC looking at these
25 matters, rather than the ISC or the FAC at this stage
196
1 being particularly interested.
2 A. I think you have to draw a distinction between what is
3 described here as the BBC/AC row and the issue of
4 substance which were the allegations over the misuse of
5 intelligence and the corruption of the process of the
6 Joint Intelligence Committee. That was the nature of
7 the allegations that had been made. Those were very
8 germane to the work of the ISC, and it was in the
9 Government's interest to clear that matter up and have
10 a definitive statement on the record. I have no reason
11 to believe that the ISC itself was not extremely
12 concerned with the allegations that had been made. The
13 row and the toing and froing between the No. 10 press
14 office and the BBC is another matter.
15 LORD HUTTON: Yes. So is it a fair summary that what you
16 have described as a serious attack on the integrity of
17 the Government, which you regarded to be ill-founded,
18 was what concerned you and your colleagues, and the row
19 between the BBC and Alastair Campbell, as it were, ran
20 on somewhat similar lines but it was of much less
21 importance than the issue that concerned you?
22 A. Considerably less importance.
23 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
24 A. Can I also add on this e-mail --
25 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
197
1 A. -- that I recall, whether it was this e-mail or
2 a similar e-mail or a reference to e-mails by my private
3 secretary, to the effect that the Clerk to the Committee
4 had possibly not caught up with the latest assessment of
5 the source and the likelihood that Dr Kelly was the
6 source, and that we should ensure that the Clerk to the
7 ISC was properly briefed on the state of our thinking,
8 because, as this -- I think this e-mail reveals he was
9 possibly slightly behind the hunt.
10 LORD HUTTON: Because he said he implied that he did not
11 believe it was the source.
12 A. Yes.
13 MR DINGEMANS: Dr Kelly does give evidence to the ISC.
14 Before he does that, has anyone done the task I have
15 asked you about, which is to find out how Dr Kelly knew,
16 if he did know and reported it to Mr Gilligan, that the
17 45 minutes was added late and that it was single
18 sourced?
19 A. I am not aware of a definitive answer to that. I am
20 aware of an analysis that shows that we still do not
21 know the truth of that -- there are a number of
22 explanations. As I say, we are no further forward in
23 knowing what those are.
24 Q. We now know that Dr Kelly commented on the growth
25 material, because we have seen his e-mail of
198
1 10th September. We now know because we have been told
2 that Dr Kelly was at a meeting of the DIS on
3 19th September when they were considering a draft, said
4 to be 15th but probably 16th September. Was any of this
5 shared with the ISC?
6 A. (Pause). I am not aware that it was.
7 Q. I have the transcripts. We can go through them if we
8 want. It does not necessarily appear on the
9 transcripts.
10 A. But it would not, I think, be for us to brief the ISC.
11 Their first step would be to take evidence from
12 Dr Kelly, then they would ask their own questions of
13 myself, Mr Scarlett and other witnesses. Indeed,
14 Mr Scarlett is due to give evidence again to them
15 shortly.
16 Q. If you are not putting people in a false position, is
17 that not something that should have been clarified at
18 the start? There is Mr Gilligan, he has said something
19 that you say is completely untrue, the exaggerated
20 claims about the Government knowing that the 45 minutes
21 is false, but he has said something that is right,
22 namely it was added late and it was single sourced. If
23 all these things are being properly delved into by the
24 ISC do not or should not the ISC be told about
25 Dr Kelly's knowledge of these matters?
199
1 A. My assumption is that would indeed all come out in
2 evidence to the ISC, but the ISC is in control of its
3 own processes. We make available senior witnesses such
4 as myself and John Scarlett; and I have no doubt that
5 all these matters would be gone over. The ISC is
6 operating in a deliberative process, taking their time
7 to assemble the material and I am sure the points you
8 have made are points they would consider.
9 Q. It just goes to this point: there seems, on the face of
10 it, an inconsistency between a rush to get Dr Kelly's
11 name to the ISC and an absence of rush to get Dr Kelly's
12 involvement in the dossier to the ISC; is that fair or
13 unfair?
14 A. I think that is very unfair.
15 Q. But, as far as we know, Dr Kelly's involvement with the
16 dossier was not given to the ISC before he gave
17 evidence?
18 A. I would need to check that. I do not know that from
19 personal knowledge.
20 Q. Right. Can I finally take you to CAB/11/7 which was
21 your note, finishing off your note of 21st July? It is
22 paragraph 8. I think it just completes your final
23 involvement before you fly to Ottawa:
24 "Immediately after the meeting I went to see the
25 Clerk and explained that I was minded to write to the
200
1 Chairman in [the terms of the letter that had been
2 discussed]."
3 You met the Clerk; is that right?
4 A. That is correct.
5 Q. And the Clerk expressed some concern that they would not
6 want to be in a position publicly of having to see an
7 individual, they would make up their own mind on the
8 progress of their inquiry. I think you have reported
9 that, and your subsequent telephone conversation with
10 Ann~Taylor?
11 A. That is correct.
12 Q. And that, I think, included your actual involvement in
13 the matters surrounding Dr Kelly's death; is that right?
14 A. That is correct.
15 Q. Is there anything else that you know of the matters
16 surrounding Dr Kelly's death that you can assist his
17 Lordship with?
18 A. I do not believe so, no.
19 Q. Is there anything else you wanted to add?
20 A. No.
21 LORD HUTTON: Thank you very much indeed. I will rise now
22 and sit again at 10.30 tomorrow morning.
23 (4.25 pm)
24 (Hearing adjourned until 10.30 am the following day)
25
201
1 INDEX
2 PAGE
3 MR ANDREW MACKINLAY (called) ..................... 1
4
5 Examined by MR DINGEMANS ..................... 1
6
7 MR JOHN MCLEOD SCARLETT (called) ................. 30
8
9 Examined by MR DINGEMANS ..................... 30
10
11 SIR DAVID OMAND (called) ......................... 158
12
13 Examined by MR DINGEMANS ..................... 158
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
202