UK Parliament / Open data

Report of the Iraq Inquiry

Proceeding contribution from Caroline Lucas (Green Party) in the House of Commons on Wednesday, 13 July 2016. It occurred during Debate on Report of the Iraq Inquiry.

I am grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for giving way and agree with him on the dangers of focusing on just one person. We need to focus on that person, but we also need to focus on the system. However, I worry about the way in which the right hon. and learned Gentleman appears to be letting off that one person from any real responsibility for misleading the House. We only have to read Chilcot to see, for example, how Blair misled the House about the position of the French. The motion Blair moved in the House stated that,

“it has not proved possible to secure a second Resolution in the UN because one Permanent Member of the Security Council made plain in public its intention to use its veto whatever the circumstances”.—[Official Report, 18 March 2003; Vol. 401, c. 760.]

Yet within a few minutes, even before Prime Minister’s questions, the French were on the phone to Tony Blair saying, “You are deliberately misrepresenting our position.” This happens time and again in the Chilcot report, so while we should not focus only on one man, let us not let him off the hook completely. That does not do any of us any good.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
613 c338 
Session
2016-17
Chamber / Committee
House of Commons chamber
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