Hearing Transcripts

1 Wednesday, 27th August 2003
2 (10.30 am)
3 LORD HUTTON: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
4 Yes, Mr Dingemans.
5 MR DINGEMANS: My Lord, the Secretary of State for Defence.
6 LORD HUTTON: Thank you.
7 MR GEOFF HOON (called)
8 Examined by MR DINGEMANS
9 MR DINGEMANS: Could you tell his Lordship your full name.
10 A. I am Geoffrey William Hoon.
11 Q. And you are Secretary of State for Defence?
12 A. Yes, I am.
13 Q. When were you appointed Secretary of State for Defence?
14 A. In October 1999.
15 Q. Did you have any involvement in the drafting of the
16 dossier that was published by the Government on
17 24th September 2002?
18 A. I saw two drafts of the dossier in the week beginning
19 16th September 2002, relatively late stage in the
20 process of the drafting, and I did not offer any
21 comments or suggest any changes to it.
22 Q. Were you aware of the Defence Intelligence Staff
23 involvement with the drafting of the dossier?
24 A. I knew that there would have been from within the
25 Ministry of Defence participation by the DIS in the

1
1 preparation, but I was not aware of what specific
2 contribution they had made.
3 Q. Were you aware of any unhappiness expressed by members
4 of the DIS with the dossier, either before or after
5 publication?
6 A. Not at the time, not before publication. Very much
7 later, preparation for evidence that I gave to the ISC,
8 I was aware that two officials had expressed some
9 concern about certain language used in the dossier.
10 I think it is important that I emphasise that this was
11 of a linguistic kind. The debate was whether particular
12 intelligence "indicated" or "suggested" or "showed"
13 a particular conclusion. So it was a very technical
14 discussion by individuals in DIS; perhaps, not
15 surprisingly, very expert people trying to ensure that
16 the language was absolutely precise.
17 Q. If I show you MoD/4/6, is this the memo to which I think
18 you have just referred to? It is a memo dated
19 18th July 2003. It should come up on your screen:
20 "The ISC is likely to probe the Secretary of State
21 and the former CDI [Chief of Defence Intelligence] about
22 the process through which the members of the DIS can
23 express concerns..."
24 Is that the document to which you were referring?
25 A. Yes, it is. It is part of the preparation I received

2
1 for giving evidence to the ISC in July.
2 Q. At MoD/4/9 we see the concerns reported to you, I think,
3 as part of the annex to the briefing note; is that
4 right? (Pause). Do you recognise that?
5 A. I do not specifically recognise it, but it appears to
6 refer to the general issue that I have just set out,
7 yes.
8 Q. And you had no other involvement with the dossier
9 itself?
10 A. No.
11 Q. Can I then turn to a lunch that we have heard from
12 Ms Watts that Dr Kelly reported having with you in
13 about April time. Did you, in fact, have lunch with
14 Dr Kelly at any time?
15 A. No, I did not. It is my practice from time to time to
16 eat in the Old War Office Building canteen. That was
17 particularly the case in the course of the conflict
18 because I was there long periods of the time and
19 throughout weekends. When I am there, I routinely talk
20 to members of the armed forces but also obviously to
21 officials.
22 On this particular occasion I had lunch with
23 a private secretary from my private office. At the end
24 of lunch we were approached by an official, I did not
25 know who it was. We talked about Iraq. We discussed

3
1 the Government policy, which the official said he
2 strongly supported; and it was not a formal occasion in
3 any sense at all. It was the kind of conversation that
4 I had routinely with people in the Ministry of Defence.
5 I did not know that it was Dr Kelly at the time.
6 I only realised that it was Dr Kelly when, after his
7 death, I visited his wife and daughters and one of the
8 daughters reminded me of this meeting and this occasion.
9 And I immediately realised, of course, that it was
10 Dr Kelly.
11 Q. He is said to have said to Ms Watts that you remarked
12 that there was a "mosaic of evidence" being built up.
13 Does that ring any bells?
14 A. I do not recall using the specific word "mosaic"
15 although I clearly could have done because I think that
16 is consistent with the way in which I have described the
17 intelligence picture as far as Iraq under Saddam Hussein
18 was concerned.
19 I have been in this position for almost four years.
20 Before that I was briefly in the Foreign Office, with,
21 for a period of time, responsibility for the
22 Middle East. Therefore I have been seeing intelligence
23 material in relation to Iraq now for well over
24 four years. And it is my view of that intelligence that
25 it is cumulative, that it builds up to a picture.

4
1 Intelligence tends not to be in the form of a large
2 volume of material submitted at any one time. It is
3 a series of individual sometimes pieces of information
4 that build up into a picture. So actually "mosaic" is
5 quite a good word to describe the picture that
6 I perceived about Iraq's position in relation to weapons
7 of mass destruction.
8 Q. That appears to have been April. On 29th May
9 Mr Gilligan made his broadcast on the Today Programme.
10 What was your reaction to that broadcast?
11 A. Well, he had made what I considered to be a very serious
12 charge against the Government, essentially that the
13 Government was lying to Parliament and to the British
14 people. And I took particular exception to that charge
15 because of my responsibility for decisions affecting the
16 lives of British servicemen and servicewomen. I was
17 also concerned that essentially the way in which this
18 material was presented by the BBC meant that it was
19 impossible for the public or Parliament to evaluate the
20 standing, the knowledge, the experience, the background
21 of Andrew Gilligan's anonymous source.
22 Normally when assessing evidence it is possible to
23 look at the source of the evidence to make a judgment as
24 to whether that person has knowledge or experience
25 sufficient to bring forward that particular piece of

5
1 information. By relying on an anonymous source that
2 opportunity was denied to the public and denied to
3 Parliament.
4 Q. Does that mean when the source was identified it became
5 particularly important to identify what his
6 qualifications were?
7 A. Certainly that is part of the normal process by which
8 evidence is evaluated, whether in court or in human
9 relations.
10 Q. We have been told about investigations that were carried
11 out after the broadcast on 29th May. Were you aware of
12 any of these investigations?
13 A. No, I was not.
14 Q. We know that Mr Gilligan gave evidence to the Foreign
15 Affairs Committee on 19th June. Did you note his
16 evidence and reflect on that at all?
17 A. Certainly it seemed to reflect the material that he had
18 broadcast and the material that he had set out in an
19 article in The Mail on Sunday. There was a particular
20 emphasis, in the evidence that he gave to the Foreign
21 Affairs Committee as against what he broadcast and
22 wrote, on the source. He referred, in the Foreign
23 Affairs Committee, continually to the fact that this is
24 what his source had told him, rather than necessarily
25 asserting that it was true.

6
1 Later I did look again at the transcript because on
2 the assumption that Mr Gilligan was telling the truth to
3 the Committee, I was trying to see whether he gave any
4 clear indication about the nature of the source and who
5 that source might be.
6 Q. You say later you looked again at the transcript. When
7 was that, that you looked again?
8 A. It was once Dr Kelly had come forward, because my
9 concern throughout was to try to identify whether or not
10 Dr Kelly was, in fact, Andrew Gilligan's single source.
11 Q. Were you aware whether or not notice had been given to
12 the Ministry of Defence about the proposed broadcast?
13 A. I believe very strongly that notice was not given; and
14 it was one aspect of my concern about the way in which
15 this material had been published by Mr Gilligan and the
16 Today Programme that no proper opportunity was given to
17 the Ministry of Defence to respond to it.
18 LORD HUTTON: Was that to respond after the report had been
19 broadcast or before it was broadcast?
20 A. The concern, obviously, came after the broadcast because
21 Mr Gilligan, and I think subsequently John Humphrys on
22 the Today Programme, stated strongly that this had been
23 checked with the Ministry of Defence, the implication
24 being that the Ministry of Defence had had the
25 opportunity of responding to the allegations made by

7
1 Andrew Gilligan, and that was not the case.
2 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
3 A. And a record of contacts by journalists to the Ministry
4 of Defence press office is kept. That did not show that
5 Andrew Gilligan had informed the MoD press office at all
6 of the nature of the broadcast that he was going to make
7 on that Thursday morning; and that no effort, therefore,
8 was made by Andrew Gilligan to apprise us of the nature
9 of the broadcast.
10 LORD HUTTON: As regards apprising you of the nature of the
11 broadcast, did you feel that the MoD should have been
12 given notice of it before the report was broadcast, so
13 it had the opportunity to point out to the BBC that the
14 criticism was unfounded, or that your opportunity to
15 reply should be in the Today Programme after the report
16 had been broadcast?
17 A. I personally believe that it would have given much
18 better balance to the story that was broadcast if we had
19 had the opportunity, at the time, to respond; so that --
20 LORD HUTTON: "At the time"; you mean before it was
21 broadcast?
22 A. Before it was broadcast. But then it would have
23 appeared, presumably, in the broadcast to the effect
24 that the Ministry of Defence did not accept the
25 allegations made by Andrew Gilligan and the Today

8
1 Programme.
2 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
3 MR DINGEMANS: We know on 28th June that Mr Bradshaw goes on
4 to the Today Programme. This is CAB/1/378. He speaks
5 with Mr Humphrys about whether or not notice is given.
6 We have seen this in the past. I think you have seen at
7 least extracts of the broadcasts.
8 A. I actually heard the broadcast at the time.
9 Q. You heard the broadcast. He follows it up with a letter
10 at CAB/1/389. That is responded to; you can see his
11 letter to Mr Sambrook which is dated 28th June, after
12 his interview. Were you party to any of this
13 letter-writing at this stage?
14 A. I was not party to that particular letter but, from
15 memory, I believe that Mr Sambrook responded and in his
16 response stated that there had been contact with the
17 Ministry of Defence press office alerting the Ministry
18 of Defence press office to -- as a result of that,
19 I then wrote to Richard Sambrook indicating that this
20 was not true and that I hoped that he and the BBC would
21 correct that fact.
22 Q. We see at CAB/1/390 Mr Sambrook's letter of 29th June
23 suggesting that there had been contact, and you can see
24 that coming up on the screen.
25 A. Yes, I have seen that.

9
1 Q. Mr Bradshaw writes a follow up letter. But you write
2 a letter at CAB/1/403.
3 A. I think 2nd July.
4 Q. Yes. And in terms of the dispute with the BBC, we have
5 seen that effectively Mr Campbell has written on
6 26th June and he has got a response on 27th June which
7 he considered did not address the issues. He goes on to
8 Channel 4 on 27th June and strongly reaffirms that.
9 On 28th June Mr Bradshaw takes up, as it were,
10 a slightly different tack in relation to the absence of
11 notice; and you join in with that after Mr Sambrook's
12 reply of 30th June that we have just looked at.
13 Was this part of a letter-writing campaign or
14 anything that was being orchestrated against the BBC at
15 this stage?
16 A. It was certainly not orchestrated. I joined in because
17 I felt that Richard Sambrook was stating something that
18 I knew, from the records kept in the Ministry of
19 Defence, was wrong.
20 Q. Did you have any discussions with Mr Campbell about your
21 proposed letter-writing?
22 A. I spoke to him, I think it was immediately after the
23 interview involving Ben Bradshaw, I think on a Saturday
24 morning, essentially to make the point that I am just
25 making to you now, that there was a record in the

10
1 Ministry of Defence press office. That record did not
2 appear to bear out what John Humphrys had been saying.
3 Q. I think there was further correspondence with
4 Mr Sambrook. We see his reply to you at CAB/1/401.
5 A. 3rd July?
6 Q. Yes. And we can see a fairly short letter saying:
7 clearly your version of what happened differs from ours.
8 I take that seriously and will look again. I think you
9 write on 4th July at CAB/1/408, is that right?
10 A. I have a letter dated 3rd July. So I wrote almost
11 immediately in response.
12 Q. Right. Effectively picking up those points.
13 A. If I may say that my concern, essentially, here was
14 twofold. One, that I did not believe that
15 Andrew Gilligan was necessarily reliably informing the
16 world about what had happened in relation to his
17 contacts with the Ministry of Defence press office.
18 I was also concerned that he was not necessarily
19 reliably informing his manager, Richard Sambrook, as to
20 what had taken place.
21 Q. And you wanted to bring that to Mr Sambrook's attention?
22 A. I did.
23 Q. On 3rd July, whilst this correspondence is being
24 exchanged, did you hear anything relating to Dr Kelly?
25 A. It was on the evening of the -- the late afternoon, in

11
1 the first place, on 3rd July that I was told that an
2 official had come forward. I apologise for my
3 hesitation but I did not hear anything in relation to
4 Dr Kelly at that stage because no-one at that stage gave
5 me a name or told me the identity of the official who
6 had come forward. I was simply told, by my principal
7 private secretary, that --
8 Q. That is Sir Kevin Tebbit, is it?
9 A. My principal private secretary is Peter Watkins. This
10 was my private office informing me that someone had come
11 forward, that the Permanent Secretary would like to have
12 a conversation with me, that is Sir Kevin Tebbit; and
13 suggesting that we should meet later that day. In fact,
14 we eventually met in the evening of 3rd July, where
15 I was told in a little more detail, but still not given
16 the name, that an official had indicated that he had had
17 contact with Andrew Gilligan during what I might say was
18 the relevant time period before the broadcast.
19 Q. Were you told anything about a letter that the official
20 had written?
21 A. I was told that he had set out, in some detail, that he
22 had had this meeting with Andrew Gilligan. There were
23 various details put to me, but I -- the significant
24 thing was that although he had recognised some of the
25 things that Andrew Gilligan subsequently broadcast as

12
1 being attributable to him and to his conversation, he
2 did not believe that he was Andrew Gilligan's single
3 source because there were other things in the broadcast
4 that he did not recognise as having said to
5 Andrew Gilligan in the course of that meeting.
6 Q. Did you have any initial reaction to this information?
7 A. I think my first -- my very first reaction was that this
8 was something that could well lead to disciplinary
9 proceedings, as far as the official was concerned. The
10 Ministry of Defence, in the period -- for some time, has
11 had something of a reputation for unauthorised briefing
12 and leaking to journalists; and it did appear that this
13 was perhaps an opportunity to demonstrate that
14 unauthorised contacts with journalists would be looked
15 at seriously.
16 Q. Can I just there take you to a reference which is
17 5th June 2003, MoD/1/17? This is a memorandum from
18 Martin Howard who the Deputy Chief of Defence
19 Intelligence. He says, in paragraph 2, that the
20 Ministry of Defence had a reputation as a "leaky"
21 department.
22 Over the page at MoD/1/18, towards the bottom, he
23 said this:
24 "I repeat, that I have no reason to think that
25 anyone in the DIS is responsible for the leak to

13
1 Mr Gilligan. But if it turns out that this is the case
2 and the individual is identified, the strongest possible
3 action will be taken."
4 Which I think you say accords with your initial
5 thought?
6 A. That was certainly my very first thought, because over
7 some time there had been warnings to -- I will not just
8 say officials, because this extended obviously as well
9 to members of the armed forces. It was not simply
10 a question of officials being warned, it was a concern
11 generally about security, not least in times of
12 conflict, that information should be held securely
13 within the department.
14 Q. Your other reaction?
15 A. Immediately, perhaps almost at the same time, I was also
16 concerned at the Foreign Affairs Committee hearings
17 because my assumption was that any disciplinary process
18 will take some considerable time to complete. On that
19 Thursday, as far as I was aware, the Foreign Affairs
20 Committee was still meeting, still hearing, as part of
21 their investigation into the decision to take military
22 action in Iraq, a significant part of which was
23 concerned with the Andrew Gilligan broadcast and the
24 role that he had played and Alastair Campbell had
25 played. So I was very concerned, at that stage, that if

14
1 an official had come forward who had relevant evidence
2 to that inquiry, that that would be something that we
3 would have to make known, quite quickly, to the Foreign
4 Affairs Committee.
5 Q. I appreciate the Foreign Affairs Committee is not
6 a Select Committee that reports on your department, the
7 Ministry of Defence.
8 A. No.
9 Q. But we have seen in their final report that they were
10 critical that the Government was cooperating with the
11 Intelligence and Security Committee and not really
12 cooperating with them; and they made a number of points.
13 For example, they had asked for drafts of the dossier
14 and not been given them. Were you party to any
15 decisions about the cooperation or absence of
16 cooperation with the Foreign Affairs Committee as it was
17 progressing?
18 A. No, I was not, although I was obviously aware of the
19 debates taking place. They concerned, for example,
20 access to intelligence material. The Foreign Affairs
21 Committee felt very strongly that they should see the
22 relevant intelligence background as part of the decision
23 to take military action. There was also a considerable
24 discussion about whether, in fact, Alastair Campbell
25 should give evidence to the Committee. As you say, it

15
1 is not strictly my responsibility, but I would not
2 necessarily accept that there was any lack of
3 cooperation on the part of the Government.
4 Alastair Campbell subsequently did give evidence to
5 the Foreign Affairs Committee and indeed, as
6 I understand it, the Foreign Secretary found a way of
7 making available to the Committee significant parts of
8 the intelligence background. So actually there was, in
9 practice, cooperation with the Committee, although
10 I think it is fair to say that most Select Committees
11 most of the time will suggest that they are not
12 receiving the kind of cooperation from the Government
13 that they would ideally like.
14 Q. Did you decide, when you were talking to
15 Sir Kevin Tebbit, what to do in relation to Dr Kelly,
16 about interviews or anything else?
17 A. Well, I did not decide because it has always been my
18 practice, in the Ministry of Defence, to ensure that
19 appropriate responsibilities are dealt with by
20 appropriate people. When I first arrived in the
21 Ministry of Defence I think it was the then Chief of
22 Defence Staff described the leadership of the Ministry
23 of Defence as a three legged stool. He had
24 responsibility for military matters; the Permanent
25 Secretary had responsibility for personnel matters,

16
1 Civil Service; and I was responsible for political
2 leadership of the department. Therefore, as far as any
3 personnel issues were concerned, the responsibility was
4 clearly that of the Permanent Secretary.
5 Q. Was anything said about interviews with Dr Kelly though,
6 in your discussions?
7 A. The Permanent Secretary summarised the position
8 consistently, I believe, with the thoughts that I have
9 just set out to you in terms of my initial reaction,
10 which was that either there could be a disciplinary
11 process affecting the official or there could be what he
12 described as a management process, reflecting the fact
13 that the official had come forward, was apparently
14 cooperating, and could, he believed at that stage,
15 correct the public record, that is the material that
16 Andrew Gilligan had broadcast. That was his analysis of
17 the issue. That analysis I accepted because he was
18 responsible for those personnel questions.
19 LORD HUTTON: Was correcting the public record a personnel
20 matter?
21 A. As far as Sir Kevin was concerned, it was important to
22 the Ministry of Defence and indeed to the Government as
23 a whole that the public record should be corrected.
24 I think he viewed that as a management issue, as far as
25 dealing with the official was concerned.

17
1 MR DINGEMANS: After the --
2 LORD HUTTON: What did you understand by the public record
3 being corrected, Secretary of State?
4 A. I think it is important that I do not get ahead of my
5 knowledge at this stage, my Lord.
6 LORD HUTTON: Leave it to a later stage if you prefer.
7 A. I think I can say this: at the time --
8 LORD HUTTON: I just want to know what was in your thoughts
9 at the time.
10 A. At the time we were obviously concerned about the
11 broadcast that Andrew Gilligan had made. It appeared
12 possible, but I can go no further than that and I would
13 not put it any more strongly, that this particular
14 official, at that time, would have had something
15 relevant to say about the content of the broadcast and
16 how Andrew Gilligan came about the material that he
17 relied on for making the broadcast. But at that stage,
18 I was told that the official did not believe that he was
19 Andrew Gilligan's single source or primary source, and
20 the issue, therefore, was his exact status in relation
21 to the material that Andrew Gilligan had relied on.
22 MR DINGEMANS: Did you speak to anyone that evening, after
23 your conversation with Sir Kevin Tebbit?
24 A. I had a brief conversation that evening with
25 Jonathan Powell simply to alert him and the

18
1 Prime Minister to the fact that this official had come
2 forward.
3 Q. Why were you speaking to Mr Powell at that stage?
4 A. It seemed to me a matter of significance for the
5 Government that an official who might have something
6 relevant to say had come forward. It would be standard
7 practice on an issue of that significance for me, and
8 I am sure for other Secretaries of State, to inform the
9 Prime Minister.
10 Q. The 4th July we know is a Friday. Where are you on that
11 day?
12 A. I was in my constituency.
13 Q. Did you have any discussions relating to Dr Kelly, as we
14 now know him to be, on that day? You at that stage know
15 him to be an official.
16 A. I think it is important that I just fill in the
17 background. On the Thursday evening Kevin Tebbit had
18 made clear to me that there would have to be an
19 interview conducted by the personnel director,
20 Richard Hatfield. I think my only involvement in the
21 process is I was asked by Kevin whether that interview
22 should take place on the Friday or the following Monday.
23 Because of my concern about the Foreign Affairs
24 Committee I suggested that it was better that that
25 interview should take place sooner rather than later.

19
1 It therefore took place on the Friday.
2 The further conversation I had on the Friday was
3 about the results of that interview conducted by
4 Richard Hatfield.
5 Q. Well, who gave you the results of the interview?
6 A. Kevin Tebbit called me to say that the --
7 Q. On the telephone?
8 A. Yes, called me to say that the interview had taken place
9 but that it was inconclusive as to whether or not the
10 official -- and I think it was in that conversation that
11 I first learned of his name, so perhaps it would be
12 sensible if I described him from now on as Dr Kelly.
13 I was told, for the first time, his identity. But I was
14 told that the interview had not established whether or
15 not he was, in fact, Andrew Gilligan's primary source.
16 Q. Do you remember what time of day this conversation took
17 place?
18 A. I am almost sure that it would have been towards the
19 evening. I have checked my diary for that day. I had
20 a very full programme of engagements in the
21 constituency, including constituency surgery which again
22 is done by appointment. So there was not a lot of free
23 time in my diary that day. So I assume it would have
24 been some time in the early evening.
25 Q. Did you have any discussions with Mr Campbell on that

20
1 day?
2 A. To the best of my recollection, the first time that
3 I spoke to Alastair Campbell about this was on the
4 Saturday morning; but I -- that is really largely
5 because of the busy nature of a full constituency day.
6 I do not believe I had a conversation with Alastair on
7 the Friday evening, I think it was the Saturday morning.
8 Q. Friday evening or Saturday morning. What was the nature
9 of your conversation with him?
10 A. Well, the reason that I believe that it was Saturday
11 morning was that there was an article in The Times on
12 Saturday morning by Tom Baldwin which I saw in the press
13 cuttings faxed to me that morning, which seemed to
14 indicate some very detailed knowledge on the part of
15 Tom Baldwin about the identity of Andrew Gilligan's
16 single source. Because it was a media issue, and
17 therefore something for which Alastair is responsible,
18 I called him to say that I had seen this article and
19 felt that it was of some significance.
20 I also spoke to Kevin Tebbit, who had also seen the
21 article and who had also quite independently thought it
22 was significant. Alastair, of course, had seen the
23 article and told me that, as far as he was concerned,
24 Tom Baldwin had got the material in the piece from an
25 editorial lunch attended by Richard Sambrook at the

21
1 offices of The Times.
2 Q. Did you speak to Mr Campbell about your initial
3 reactions on hearing the news of Dr Kelly coming
4 forward?
5 A. Yes, I did. I described to him the process that I have
6 set out to you now, which is what my initial reaction
7 was, the importance of security of information in the
8 Ministry of Defence and the possibility of there being
9 disciplinary proceedings, but also I emphasised to him
10 my concern about any suggestion that the Government
11 should be covering up the fact of a potential witness
12 coming forward, in the light of the continuing, as
13 I felt at the time, Foreign Affairs Committee
14 deliberations. So I went through precisely the process
15 that I have gone through today of describing to him both
16 my initial reaction and then my thoughts about the
17 relevance of this to the Foreign Affairs Committee.
18 Q. I think Mr Campbell's recollection was that the
19 conversation was on the Friday. He also mentioned that
20 after you had spoken about your initial instincts in
21 relation to disciplinary proceedings, you mentioned the
22 words "plea bargain". Do you recollect mentioning that
23 to Mr Campbell?
24 A. I do not remember using that particular phrase to him,
25 but I can see that as a shorthand account of what I had

22
1 described to him it would have summarised, in a sense,
2 the alternatives available to the personnel director in
3 the Ministry of Defence in dealing with Dr Kelly. But
4 I would want to emphasise that it was never the case
5 that Richard Hatfield or anyone else in the Ministry of
6 Defence offered any kind of an arrangement or deal to
7 Dr Kelly. I have subsequently read the accounts that
8 Richard Hatfield has set out of the interviews he
9 conducted with Dr Kelly. There was no mention of any
10 kind of a deal or plea bargain. It was simply perhaps
11 Alastair's summary of the material that I had set out to
12 him; and the material I had set out was entirely
13 retrospective. It was not in any way suggesting how the
14 matter would be taken forward.
15 Q. What had you said to Mr Campbell that could be written
16 down in shorthand as a plea bargain?
17 A. I had taken him through, in precisely the way I have
18 done today, my initial reaction, which was this was
19 potentially a serious disciplinary issue. But equally
20 my second thought, which was that this potential witness
21 might have something to say relevant to the Foreign
22 Affairs Committee hearing and that we would have to take
23 care to avoid any suggestion that we might be seen to be
24 covering up the fact of this witness, given the
25 importance of the issue to the Foreign Affairs

23
1 Committee.
2 LORD HUTTON: But Secretary of State, a plea bargain, as
3 I understand it, usually means that a person charged
4 with some sort of offence agrees to plead guilty on the
5 understanding that he will not receive a very severe
6 sentence.
7 A. That is also my understanding, my Lord.
8 LORD HUTTON: Yes. But do you think you might have used
9 this term or do you think it is a term which Mr Campbell
10 attributed to the sense of what you were saying to him?
11 A. Well, I do not recall using the phrase.
12 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
13 A. I can see that in the description that I gave of the
14 process that had taken place up until then, that that
15 might be a shorthand account, because normally
16 disciplinary proceedings would follow from an
17 investigation where the authorities inside the Ministry
18 of Defence, as a result of their efforts, had identified
19 a particular individual who might have broken the rules.
20 In contrast, this particular individual had come
21 forward. He had written quite a detailed letter, had
22 volunteered information, was apparently cooperating.
23 So, in a sense, my Lord, without it being in any way
24 a formalised arrangement, and I would want to emphasise
25 this was not in any way acted upon by Richard Hatfield

24
1 or anyone else, that that might have been seen to be of
2 that kind by Alastair in the course of his summarising
3 our conversation.
4 MR DINGEMANS: Did you suggest to Mr Campbell that Dr Kelly
5 had said that the intelligence went in late, or the
6 45 minute claim had gone in late? Do you recollect that
7 as any part of your conversation?
8 A. I do not remember that specific point being made; but
9 I certainly indicated to him that Dr Kelly had said that
10 some of the material used by Andrew Gilligan he
11 recognised and was clearly from him in the course of the
12 conversations that he had had, but some of the material
13 was not. And it may well have been that that particular
14 aspect of it was part of the material that he
15 recognised.
16 Q. At this stage, had you seen Dr Kelly's letter which we
17 can see at MoD/1/19?
18 A. I had seen it. I --
19 Q. When had you seen it?
20 A. I had seen it the previous evening, because I think it
21 was following my conversation with Kevin Tebbit, when he
22 reported the results of the initial interview with
23 Richard Hatfield, I was concerned to know more about the
24 background of the official coming forward. Therefore
25 I asked for that to be sent to my office. It was sent

25
1 to my constituency office. I do not have a secure line
2 there, so my private office topped and tailed the letter
3 to ensure that it was not identifiable.
4 Q. So you see that on the Friday at your constituency?
5 A. Yes, Friday evening.
6 Q. Did you see any notes of the interview on that day?
7 A. No, I did not.
8 Q. But you were told about that by the Permanent Secretary?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. And what level of detail did Sir Kevin Tebbit go into
11 about the interview?
12 A. I think the point I have made already, which was that as
13 a result of the interview Richard Hatfield, the
14 personnel director, had concluded that Dr Kelly was not
15 the single source, was not the primary source that
16 Andrew Gilligan had relied on, and that, therefore, it
17 would not be possible at that stage for Kevin Tebbit to
18 seek to correct the public record -- I think that was
19 the phrase that he used -- on the basis of Dr Kelly
20 having come forward.
21 LORD HUTTON: What did you understand by Sir Kevin Tebbit
22 correcting the public record? I mean, if Mr Hatfield
23 had concluded that Dr Kelly was the single source, how
24 did you understand that Sir Kevin Tebbit would correct
25 the public record?

26
1 A. Well, I think that is a --
2 LORD HUTTON: Again, perhaps this is coming ahead to a point
3 you will deal with later.
4 A. We were all concerned, but not only the politicians,
5 my Lord, but also senior officials, including
6 Kevin Tebbit, about the allegations that Andrew Gilligan
7 had made, because they went to the heart of the
8 Government's credibility and trust.
9 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
10 A. Therefore Sir Kevin was equally concerned to ensure that
11 if there was relevant evidence supplied by an official
12 who had had a relevant contact with Andrew Gilligan,
13 that he could then use that material to demonstrate
14 actually that what Andrew Gilligan had asserted in his
15 broadcast was not, in fact, true.
16 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
17 MR DINGEMANS: Were you aware, as far as Mr Hatfield was
18 concerned, who is the personnel director, that the
19 disciplinary side of proceedings had been concluded on
20 that Friday evening?
21 A. I do not think that was made known to me on the Friday
22 evening. I learned subsequently that that was the case;
23 but certainly I had understood -- I know
24 Richard Hatfield very well, he was formerly the policy
25 director in the Ministry of Defence and I had regular

27
1 contact with him when he was in that position. He is an
2 extremely capable and effective civil servant and I knew
3 he would have gone through the material thoroughly and
4 fairly with Dr Kelly.
5 Q. We can see at MoD/1/26, which is part way through notes
6 of the meeting on 4th July, and it is the first main
7 paragraph, Mr Hatfield says he is prepared to accept his
8 account in good faith. On the basis of his letter he
9 breached departmental instructions.
10 He says later down that paragraph:
11 "This was a potentially very serious matter.
12 Nevertheless, I accepted his assurance that there had
13 been no malicious intent and there appeared no reason to
14 believe that classified material had been revealed. On
15 that basis, I judged that it would not be appropriate to
16 initiate formal disciplinary proceedings. I would,
17 however, write to him shortly to record my displeasure
18 at his conduct."
19 In fact we know he wrote on 9th July. When did you
20 become aware that had been the outcome of the
21 disciplinary side of the process?
22 A. I am not sure I could give you a precise date. To the
23 best of my recollection, there was some delay between
24 the decision that Richard Hatfield took and actually
25 seeing Dr Kelly to communicate that fact to him. But

28
1 I was certainly aware, probably second-hand, either from
2 my private office or from Sir Kevin, that some sort of
3 process was to be gone through with Dr Kelly arising out
4 of the interview. As I have indicated previously, these
5 were essentially personnel matters, they were not
6 matters necessarily that concern the Secretary of State.
7 Q. We also know that there was a draft press statement,
8 prepared by the Ministry of Defence that night, and
9 draft Q and A material, also prepared that night. If we
10 look at CAB/21/3, we can see at the top:
11 "Produced on 4.7.03."
12 A. Yes, I have the document in front of me.
13 Q. That was produced on the Friday evening when you were in
14 the constituency. Were you any part of this Q and A
15 material and were you consulted about it?
16 A. No, I was not. I would not expect to be consulted about
17 that kind of material. It would be prepared in the
18 press office for the guidance of individual press
19 officers, particularly those coming on duty, to ensure
20 that they had access to appropriate material should
21 these questions arise. But this was entirely material
22 that was contingent upon their being asked these
23 questions by journalists contacting the press office.
24 Q. In fact no-one contacted the press office so, as we
25 understand it, it was not deployed.

29
1 Were you aware that at this stage there had been
2 concern that Dr Kelly was the source of The Observer
3 article on mobile trailers and whether or not they were
4 related to chemical and biological weapons?
5 A. I was not aware of that at that stage, no.
6 Q. And were you aware of Dr Kelly's involvement, if any, in
7 the dossier?
8 A. Only because of the reference in the letter that he
9 originally sent to the Ministry of Defence. There was
10 a reference to his part in the dossier in his letter
11 informing the Ministry of Defence that --
12 Q. We can see the relevant extracts at MoD/1/19:
13 "As you know I have been involved in writing three
14 'dossiers'..."
15 If one scrolls down the page he says:
16 "My contributions to the latter [that is the UK
17 Government's dossier] were in part 2 (History of UN
18 Inspections) and part 1 chapter 2 (Iraq's programmes
19 1971-1998) at the behest of the FCO and I was not
20 involved in the intelligence component in any way nor in
21 the process of the dossier's compilation. I have not
22 acknowledged to anyone outside FCO my contribution ...
23 I am not a member of the intelligence community although
24 I interact with that community and I am essentially, as
25 an inspector, a consumer of intelligence not

30
1 a generator..."
2 So that is what you knew at this stage?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. You think that the conversation you had with Mr Campbell
5 was on the Saturday. Did you have any other
6 conversations with anyone else that day?
7 A. I am sure that there would have been some discussion
8 with my principal private secretary. But that is the
9 only conversation that I can recall was strictly
10 relevant, as far as these issues were concerned.
11 Q. Did you have a view at that stage about whether or not
12 it was desirable that Dr Kelly's name should be made
13 public?
14 A. I was concerned at that stage that we did not have
15 enough information to be able to be sure that Dr Kelly
16 was the single source of Andrew Gilligan's material.
17 And in those circumstances, and indeed throughout the
18 history of this matter, because I was not sure that that
19 was the case, I did not believe that it was appropriate
20 to make his name public.
21 Q. Were you aware that throughout, whether rightly or
22 wrongly, Dr Kelly was contending that he was not the
23 single source?
24 A. That he was not?
25 Q. Yes.

31
1 A. Yes, I was aware of that and I have said so already to
2 the Inquiry. I was aware of that because of the letter
3 that he wrote to the Ministry of Defence and, indeed,
4 because of the interview that he had conducted with
5 Richard Hatfield. That was a significant factor in the
6 material that Kevin Tebbit told me about following the
7 interview.
8 Q. Did you learn of any proposed meeting at the BBC over
9 this weekend?
10 A. Yes, I did. I think it was widely broadcast that there
11 was to be a meeting of the BBC governors on the Sunday
12 evening to consider these issues.
13 Q. What was your reaction to that meeting?
14 A. I think my concern, and I certainly discussed this with
15 Alastair Campbell on the Sunday, which would have been
16 the 6th, was that Andrew Gilligan may not have been
17 reliably informing senior management in the BBC of the
18 nature of his source. That particularly came out of an
19 interview that Richard Sambrook did with the Today
20 Programme somewhat earlier, where he had indicated that
21 the source was an intelligence source; and that did not
22 appear to fit with Dr Kelly's position, although
23 I recognised, and we had a good deal of discussion about
24 this -- that is Alastair Campbell and I on the Sunday --
25 that there were at least two possible explanations of

32
1 that. 1) that Andrew Gilligan had misrepresented the
2 nature of his source to his management and that they
3 were not therefore in a position to properly assess the
4 material that he had provided to them; or, and this
5 remained my concern throughout, that there was in fact
6 another primary source, that there was another person
7 who had provided more significant information to
8 Andrew Gilligan.
9 Q. Did you, on the Sunday, discuss with Mr Campbell the
10 desirability of bringing out Dr Kelly into the open?
11 A. Not as far as his name was concerned, because I remained
12 very concerned that that would have been unfair to
13 Dr Kelly at that stage, because I was not sure that he
14 was Andrew Gilligan's single source.
15 What I discussed with Alastair -- we spent a lot of
16 time discussing it, I am afraid rather fruitlessly in
17 many ways -- was how we could find a way of encouraging
18 the BBC to accept that it was in both our interests to
19 identify Andrew Gilligan's source. It seemed to me that
20 there was at least the possibility that Andrew Gilligan
21 was being less than frank with Richard Sambrook and
22 others about the nature of his source and that,
23 therefore, there was an interest both in the Ministry of
24 Defence and in the BBC of identifying who that was.
25 Q. Did you have any discussions with the Prime Minister

33
1 over the weekend about this?
2 A. I certainly had a conversation with Jonathan Powell.
3 I do not believe that I spoke directly to the
4 Prime Minister on the Sunday, no.
5 Q. And what was the nature of your conversation with
6 Mr Powell?
7 A. Well, again, it followed on from the kinds of
8 conversations that I had been having with
9 Alastair Campbell. I am pretty sure that Alastair was
10 also having them with Jonathan and probably with the
11 Prime Minister, although I have no specific evidence of
12 that. Simply that we were all concerned that someone
13 had come forward, that they might have relevant evidence
14 to give about the nature of Andrew Gilligan's contacts,
15 but that because we were not confident that he was the
16 single source that Andrew Gilligan had relied on, that
17 we could not confidently take the matter forward unless
18 we had some process whereby the BBC were willing to
19 confirm the identity of that source.
20 I think it is fair to say that Jonathan was fairly
21 sceptical about the willingness of the BBC to do that,
22 and that we discussed various ways in which, in
23 a confidential manner, senior BBC management might be
24 willing to do that, simply because I thought that it
25 might be in their interest to know whether or not, in

34
1 fact, Andrew Gilligan was reliably informing them of all
2 the relevant information about his source.
3 Q. Was this the genesis of the letters that we know you
4 wrote on the 8th and 9th or 9th and 10th?
5 A. There were a good deal of discussions in the days that
6 followed about the best way of trying to give this
7 information to the BBC or encourage the BBC to identify
8 Andrew Gilligan's source. In the end, this was the one
9 approach that was adopted. But other approaches were
10 considered as well.
11 Q. Because, I mean, logically if Dr Kelly goes before
12 anyone and he is protesting he is not the single source,
13 whether or not very clever people like Sir David Omand
14 think differently, unless the BBC have confirmed he is
15 the single source, people like the Foreign Affairs
16 Committee are likely to conclude as Mr Hatfield did,
17 namely he has nothing to do with it.
18 A. And that was exactly my view as well, because I think it
19 was extremely important, in fairness to Dr Kelly, not to
20 expose him as the single source without being sure that
21 that was true; and I was not sure that that was true.
22 And the Prime Minister was not sure that it was true.
23 Eventually on that Sunday afternoon I had a message,
24 it came from two sources, one from my private secretary
25 and one directly from Jonathan Powell, that the

35
1 Prime Minister felt there was insufficient information
2 to be able to confidently take forward any suggestion
3 that Dr Kelly was the single source and that therefore
4 we should not pursue the matter further that day, that
5 is before the meeting of the BBC governors.
6 Q. I appreciate we are running ahead of ourselves a wee
7 bit.
8 LORD HUTTON: Before we proceed, may I just ask, Secretary
9 of State: with regard to your plan vis a vis the BBC,
10 suppose you had given in confidence to the BBC or to the
11 Government Dr Kelly's name and that the BBC had then
12 confirmed that: yes, he was Mr Gilligan's source. What
13 was your thinking after that? What did you think might
14 happen or that you might bring about?
15 A. I think, at that stage, my Lord, it would have been
16 fairer for there to have been the correction of the
17 public record that Sir Kevin and I and others were
18 concerned about. If, at that stage, Dr Kelly was
19 acknowledged as being the single source that
20 Andrew Gilligan had relied on, then there is then the
21 possibility of the kind of evaluation -- public
22 evaluation of his evidence that I referred to at the
23 outset, that people could then look at what he was
24 saying in the light of his knowledge, background and
25 experience and make a judgment as to whether what he was

36
1 saying was true. But of course it would also --
2 LORD HUTTON: Sorry, on the basis it would then be
3 established he was not an intelligence source.
4 A. I was about to make a related point, my Lord, which is
5 that at that point he could indicate what he had and had
6 not said to Andrew Gilligan, so the public, Parliament,
7 we would all have been in a position to know whether
8 Andrew Gilligan had or had not exaggerated the material
9 that he had been provided with by Dr Kelly.
10 LORD HUTTON: Yes. But that would have involved Dr Kelly
11 coming forward into the public domain and stating what
12 he had said and what he had not said to Mr Gilligan?
13 A. As I had understood it, that point had been made to him
14 by Richard Hatfield in the interview on the Friday
15 afternoon.
16 LORD HUTTON: Yes.
17 A. I was not aware that Dr Kelly necessarily had any
18 concerns about his identity remaining secret. Indeed,
19 as I had understood it, he had been warned by
20 Richard Hatfield that it was most likely that his name
21 would come out. Indeed, as far as I was concerned, the
22 fact that he had come forward was based upon material
23 that a colleague of his had identified as being so close
24 to Dr Kelly's known views as to be only capable of
25 having come from Dr Kelly. And of course, that material

37
1 was material that Andrew Gilligan repeated before the
2 Foreign Affairs Committee. So I did not see that there
3 was -- it would have been surprising if Dr Kelly's name
4 came out; but at the same time, because I was not sure
5 that Dr Kelly was Andrew Gilligan's single source, I did
6 nothing to take that forward because it would have been
7 unfair to Dr Kelly.
8 I might say, it would have also made the Ministry of
9 Defence and the Government look rather foolish if we had
10 indicated that Dr Kelly was the single source, for the
11 BBC to say: well, actually he was not. That was
12 a concern that I had over that weekend.
13 MR DINGEMANS: Going forward, as it were, almost to the end
14 of the story, before Dr Kelly's death were you ever sure
15 that Dr Kelly was the single source?
16 A. Not before his death.
17 Q. But we also know that Dr Kelly's name did come out.
18 A. Yes, it did.
19 Q. So, I understood you to be saying that at that stage you
20 were still concerned with ensuring, out of fairness to
21 Dr Kelly, his name did not come out before you were sure
22 he was the single source.
23 A. That is absolutely right. Indeed, I had a conversation
24 with my private secretary on the day that the BBC made
25 their announcement, still questioning whether in fact --

38
1 because I had been told they were going to make an
2 announcement but I did not know the nature of it at the
3 time. I still was not sure on -- when was it? --
4 Sunday, about the 20th I should imagine, when they made
5 their announcement, I still was not sure at that stage,
6 before they made their announcement, that Dr Kelly was
7 their single source.
8 Q. I rushed ahead of myself a bit. Shall we go back to the
9 Sunday? Does that cover all you wanted to say about the
10 discussions on the Sunday?
11 A. Just forgive me a second. (Pause). Yes.
12 Q. Coming on then to the Monday. We have heard about
13 a meeting which took place in No. 10 and the fact that
14 you were not there but Sir Kevin Tebbit was there. Did
15 you have any discussions with Sir Kevin Tebbit before he
16 went?
17 A. He came into my office before going across to the
18 meeting in Downing Street. I think the one thing that
19 he told me at that stage was that it had been agreed
20 with the Cabinet Office and Downing Street over the
21 weekend that Dr Kelly would be interviewed again.
22 Q. It had been agreed by?
23 A. Well, I think in conversation with Sir David Omand on
24 behalf of the Cabinet Office and Downing Street.
25 Q. Right. And Sir Kevin Tebbit had agreed that?

39
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. So what were you told on the Monday morning by
3 Sir Kevin?
4 A. Well, simply that. There was some discussion about the
5 fact that Dr Kelly had already set off for
6 RAF Honnington to attend a course, I think in
7 preparation for his going back to Iraq, and therefore
8 there was discussion about how he could be returned in
9 order to be further interviewed.
10 I also discussed with him the same point that we
11 have just gone through: the possibility of approaching
12 the BBC privately to see whether they would be willing
13 to confirm the identity of Andrew Gilligan's single
14 source as part of this management process affecting both
15 institutions.
16 Q. And what was his view about that?
17 A. Well, I think it was part of the general discussions
18 that were taking place. I assumed he would have fed
19 that into the discussion that then took place in
20 Downing Street subsequently about what action to take.
21 Q. Sir Kevin goes off to Downing Street then?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. We know that the FAC report is published. Did you look
24 at it on that day?
25 A. Yes, I did. I certainly -- I do not think I looked at

40
1 the entirety of the report. I certainly looked at the
2 conclusions and recommendations. I mean, this was
3 a high profile report. It was directly concerned with
4 issues that I had obviously been very much involved
5 with, the decision to take military action in Iraq. So
6 its conclusions were of great interest to me.
7 Q. Can I take you to FAC/3/7, which is part way through the
8 conclusions part of the FAC report. Scrolling down we
9 can see there is a paragraph 26. Did you see that
10 conclusion at the time?
11 A. Yes, I did.
12 Q. Did that have any influence on your thinking?
13 A. Well, I think it simply emphasised the concern that
14 I had had since the Thursday, since I had been told that
15 an official had come forward. My concern on the
16 Thursday, as I have indicated already, is that we should
17 not be seen to be covering up the fact that this man had
18 come forward. Here was the Foreign Affairs Committee
19 actually emphasising the importance to them of
20 a thorough investigation into Andrew Gilligan's alleged
21 contact. So it rather heightened my anxiety that we
22 should not be holding back the information that someone
23 had come forward.
24 Q. Did you look at the relevant part of the report? It
25 says paragraph 154 there. In fact, that is

41
1 a typographical error and it is paragraph 152. If we
2 look at FAC/3/48 you can see paragraphs 150, 151 and 152
3 of the report. Did you look at that that morning?
4 A. I am not sure that I looked at it that morning but
5 I certainly did look at it later.
6 Q. What they say:
7 "Mr Gilligan [tells us he has lots of] ... contacts,
8 both official and unofficial."
9 They say: we are quite concerned about that. And at
10 the end of paragraph 152:
11 "We accept the need for the agencies on occasion to
12 brief the press within very strict guidelines ... [but]
13 we recommend [the] ... alleged contacts be thoroughly
14 investigated."
15 Did you read that as suggesting that anyone you
16 found had leaked a document should be hauled off before
17 the FAC?
18 A. No, I did not. But I equally recognised that the FAC
19 might have an interest in taking evidence from anyone
20 who had been in contact with Andrew Gilligan, as a way
21 of assessing the reliability of Andrew Gilligan's
22 evidence to them and indeed as a way of assessing the
23 nature of the dispute that had arisen between the
24 Government and the BBC.
25 Q. We know there was a draft press statement prepared on

42
1 7th July. That is MoD/17/2. This is something Ms Teare
2 provided after her evidence because she had referred to
3 some drafts. At the moment in the draft it says:
4 "In its Report published yesterday, the House of
5 Commons Foreign Affairs Committee recommended that
6 Andrew Gilligan's alleged contacts be thoroughly
7 investigated.
8 "In this context it may be relevant that an
9 individual working in the MoD has come forward to
10 volunteer..."
11 That press statement we know was not put out in that
12 format. Did you influence, at this stage, the draft
13 press statement because it appears to be reflecting your
14 thinking at the time?
15 A. Well, I did not see the drafts. Whether any comments
16 that I made influenced it, I do not know. It is
17 a rather difficult question for me to answer in terms of
18 whether I influenced it. I think it was well known,
19 certainly I had made this concern known to the Permanent
20 Secretary that I was anxious about the Foreign Affairs
21 Committee report and conclusion. So I may have
22 influenced the way in which that work was carried on;
23 but I certainly did not see the draft press releases in
24 preparation.
25 Q. We know that Sir David Omand has written a note after

43
1 the event, it is 21st July, in which he refers to the
2 importance of Dr Kelly cooperating with the process. We
3 also know that on 7th July, it is MoD/1/44, there is
4 a memo here which is dated 8th July but we have heard
5 that it was in fact produced on 7th July because it
6 referred to the interview that is going to take place.
7 What it says at paragraph 2 is:
8 "What is now needed now is a more intensive
9 interview with Kelly."
10 In fact it was produced on the morning, we were
11 told, of 7th July.
12 A. Hmm, hmm.
13 Q. Over the page at MoD/1/45, paragraph 5:
14 "In all this PUS [Sir Kevin Tebbit] remains
15 concerned to ensure that Dr Kelly's rights are
16 respected -- it is important to understand he is
17 cooperating voluntarily."
18 There is the different angle, that in the event that
19 it becomes evident that he may have divulged classified
20 or privileged information, proceedings would need to be
21 stopped to avoid prejudicing any case.
22 Were you aware at this stage that Dr Kelly's
23 involvement was all to be voluntary?
24 A. I certainly had understood from the beginning that
25 Dr Kelly had come forward, he had volunteered the fact

44
1 he had had a contact with Andrew Gilligan, that he was
2 cooperating. Certainly I think that is important in
3 terms of the sequence of events that took place.
4 Q. We have also seen, at CAB/1/46, a memo that Mr Scarlett
5 had dictated on the morning, where he had agreed with
6 Sir Kevin Tebbit's letter of Saturday, that is written
7 after Mr Baldwin's article, that:
8 "... the finger points strongly at David Kelly ..."
9 He had been through the transcript, he attached
10 copies of that, which make it clear that:
11 "Gilligan has only talked to one person about the
12 September dossier. If he could have referred to any
13 corroborating information he would have done so. If
14 this is true, Kelly is not telling the whole story."
15 A. Hmm.
16 Q. Were you aware of any doubts being expressed about
17 whether Dr Kelly had told the whole story, at this
18 stage?
19 A. I recognised, in the range of possibilities, that that
20 was one of them. But I was not -- I had not seen this
21 particular document. In fact, I think this is probably
22 the first time that I have seen it. I was not aware
23 that those doubts were being expressed elsewhere in
24 Government; but I recognise in the series of options of
25 facts that that was one of them.

45
1 Q. We know that at the meeting that Sir Kevin Tebbit
2 attended it was decided to give Dr Kelly a second
3 interview.
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. We also know that that took place in the afternoon of
6 the 7th July, the Monday.
7 A. Hmm.
8 Q. Were you made aware that the second interview was taking
9 place?
10 A. Yes. Yes. It was something that Kevin had mentioned to
11 me on the morning in the meeting before he went across
12 to Downing Street.
13 Q. And did anyone report to you the outcome of the second
14 interview?
15 A. I cannot recall formally that happening, but I certainly
16 was aware that that second interview had not taken the
17 issue much further forward, the issue being whether or
18 not Dr Kelly was Andrew Gilligan's single source.
19 Q. No. I mean, I think we have heard that Mr Scarlett
20 thought, as a result of his memo and the further
21 information, and Mr Howard thought, that he was
22 definitely the single source, but it does not
23 necessarily seem that Mr Hatfield had changed his view.
24 A. No.
25 Q. You were aware of a range of views on that?

46
1 A. I was aware of Richard Hatfield's view. I was not aware
2 that there were other views elsewhere. I thought I made
3 that clear earlier.
4 Q. Right. We can see that the Ministry of Defence are
5 still preparing some press statements. But these are
6 now being at least altered or improved by
7 Downing Street. If I take you to CAB/1/50 we can see
8 some of the drafting that is going on on Ministry of
9 Defence press statements. It appears that this was
10 happening on about 7th July. In fact, if you look at
11 the top left-hand corner you can see the fax date.
12 Were you aware that Downing Street was involved in
13 helping the Ministry of Defence with their press
14 statements?
15 A. I was not directly aware of that, but it would not be
16 a particular surprise given the involvement of
17 Downing Street and the Cabinet Office in these events.
18 These were events that affected the Government as
19 a whole, and therefore I would have expected there to be
20 a great deal of contact between the Ministry of Defence
21 and other parts of Government involved; in this case,
22 the Cabinet Office and Downing Street, which was
23 obviously why I called Jonathan Powell on the Thursday
24 and why Kevin Tebbit wrote to David Omand on the Friday.
25 Q. Who did you understand to be the lead department? Had

47
1 it now become No. 10 or was it still the Ministry of
2 Defence?
3 A. Well, the Ministry of Defence was the lead department as
4 far as dealing with Dr Kelly on a personnel basis, as
5 far his position, as far as the department were
6 concerned, then I was concerned that the Permanent
7 Secretary should look at that matter as an employment
8 concern issue, to look at it from a point of view of
9 ensuring that Dr Kelly was properly and fairly treated.
10 Equally, there were clearly wider implications in what
11 was happening as far as the Government as a whole were
12 concerned. That is why the Cabinet Office and
13 Downing Street were engaged.
14 Q. Did you have any conversations with Mr Campbell that
15 evening?
16 A. Yes, I did. There was a further conversation, in
17 a sense, following on from our discussions --
18 inconclusive discussions the day before about --
19 Q. Did you go and see him? Was it on the telephone?
20 A. I think it was on the telephone.
21 Q. Where were you --
22 LORD HUTTON: I think before we proceed into the details of
23 this it is a convenient time to give the stenographers
24 a break. I will rise for five minutes.
25 (11.45 am)

48
1 (Short Break)
2 (11.50 am)
3 MR DINGEMANS: We were on Monday 7th July, and you were
4 about to tell me about your telephone conversation,
5 I think you said it was, with Mr Campbell. Where were
6 you when you made the call?
7 A. As far as I am aware I was in the Ministry of Defence.
8 Q. And where is Mr Campbell?
9 A. I assume in Downing Street, but I could not give
10 evidence to that fact.
11 Q. Right. What was said in this conversation?
12 A. Well, it really was following on the conversation that
13 we had had the previous day about how to try to find
14 a way to persuade the BBC to acknowledge
15 Andrew Gilligan's single source. We discussed various
16 possibilities. I think it was on that occasion that he
17 put forward a further possibility of briefing
18 a newspaper that someone had come forward as a means of
19 putting further pressure on the BBC to acknowledge that;
20 but I had -- I was pretty doubtful about that, and
21 I think I pointed out to him that actually it still left
22 open the possibility that the BBC would simply deny it,
23 would simply say that this person was not their source;
24 and we would be no further forward.
25 LORD HUTTON: But why, if you are thinking of putting

49
1 pressure on the BBC, why brief a newspaper as opposed to
2 issuing a statement directly?
3 A. Well, my Lord, I was not thinking of briefing
4 a newspaper; and indeed I did not agree to that
5 approach. Although Alastair put it forward, I think it
6 is fair to him to say that he did not brief a newspaper
7 either. It is simply part of the discussions that were
8 taking place. It was one suggestion that he had made.
9 It was not something that I agreed to or indeed did
10 anything about.
11 LORD HUTTON: No.
12 MR DINGEMANS: Did you recall the conversation, at any time,
13 being switched on to a speaker phone?
14 A. Not at my end of the conversation, no.
15 Q. No. But when you are talking to someone and you are
16 switching on to a speaker phone, sometimes you hear it
17 sounds different, does it not?
18 A. I was not aware of that.
19 Q. You were not aware of Godric Smith joining the
20 conversation at all or listening into the conversation
21 at all?
22 A. (Pause). No.
23 Q. Did Mr Campbell mention any particular newspaper?
24 A. (Pause). Not to the best of my recollection, no.
25 Q. At this stage, did you understand whether or not

50
1 Dr Kelly was happy for his name to be given to any
2 newspaper or press statement?
3 A. That, at that stage, obviously had not been discussed
4 with Dr Kelly; and part of my concern, as well, as
5 I have indicated, certainly throughout the weekend, was
6 that whatever action we took we should be sure about the
7 factual basis; and since I was not sure on the Monday
8 evening any more than I had been over the previous
9 weekend, then I would have been uncomfortable about
10 briefing a newspaper because I did not judge that it
11 would have taken us any further forward.
12 Q. On the morning of 8th July Mr Baldwin has told us in
13 a Q and A column in The Times newspaper he had said
14 this: conversations with Downing Street say he is not
15 a member of the Intelligence Services but more likely to
16 be a weapons of mass destruction specialist at the
17 Foreign Office. He said that that was a variety of
18 conversations with sources in different Government
19 departments. For perfectly understandable reasons he
20 has not helped us any further with who those people
21 were. Do you know anything about those conversations
22 with Mr Baldwin?
23 A. No, I do not; and they certainly did not involve me.
24 Q. We have seen the defensive Q and A material that was
25 actually deployed. Can I take you to some draft Q and A

51
1 material which we have received --
2 A. Sorry, I apologise for interrupting you but when you say
3 they have actually been deployed, I am not sure it is
4 right to say they were deployed. At that stage there
5 was no reason for them to be used.
6 Q. Sorry, deployed on 8th July, 9th July.
7 A. Sorry.
8 Q. What was actually used. We have now been provided with
9 further drafts. Going to the morning of 8th July, if we
10 go to CAB/21/5, this is some Q and A material which is
11 said to have been sent to the Permanent Undersecretary
12 office at 8.07 on Tuesday, 8th July subject to
13 discussion and approval.
14 If you can look down to the fifth question:
15 "Is it X (ie the correct name)?
16 "If the correct name is put to us from a number of
17 callers, we will need to tell the individual we are
18 going to confirm his name before doing [I imagine that
19 is a typo for 'so']."
20 The actual Q and A material put out later that day
21 and used on 9th July has a rather different look to it.
22 If you look at MoD/1/62, you can see:
23 "Who is the official?"
24 At the top:
25 "We wouldn't normally volunteer a name.

52
1 "If the correct name is given, we can confirm it..."
2 That is a reasonably substantial change. One is
3 saying: we need to go back to the individual and tell
4 him first. The other appears to be: well, we will tell
5 you.
6 Do you know whether or not Dr Kelly was told about
7 the draft Q and A material and the Q and A material as
8 deployed?
9 A. I do not, no. But can I make clear that I did not see
10 either of these documents. They were not submitted to
11 my office. That would not be something that I would
12 normally deal with.
13 Q. I will come back, if I may, to the Q and A material
14 because that comes later on on 8th July.
15 A. Can I just deal with a point about "put out" because
16 I think it is something that has been dealt with
17 previously in evidence before the Inquiry? These
18 questions and answers are prepared for the use of
19 individual press officers and, particularly in the
20 Ministry of Defence where there is a 24 hour process, it
21 may well be that an individual press officer comes on
22 duty without necessarily being aware of particular
23 issues. So these questions and answers are used by
24 individual press officers to answer specific questions
25 that are put to them by journalists. They are not "put

53
1 out" in any sense at all. They are simply sitting there
2 in the press office for use by those press officers
3 should these questions arise. But they are not
4 communicated generally to the world in any sense at all.
5 Q. No, but when they ring up and ask the right question:
6 "Did he play any part in drawing up the dossier?"
7 They are told:
8 "He was involved in providing historical details..."
9 A. The director of news would be responsible for drawing up
10 these documents to guide her staff, her press officers,
11 in the work they do in responding to questions from
12 journalists.
13 Q. We have heard about some meetings that took place in
14 Downing Street on 8th July, and in particular a meeting
15 at 11.45 am when it is decided that in the light of the
16 second interview his name ought to be supplied to the
17 Intelligence and Security Committee; and it is proposed
18 initially that that is going to be by way of a letter
19 that is going to be copied to the FAC, and because it is
20 going to be copied to the FAC it is going to be made
21 public.
22 As I understand from what you were saying, the
23 Ministry of Defence were going to be the lead department
24 on the personnel side of matters, and obviously putting
25 his name to the Intelligence and Security Committee part

54
1 relates to personnel; is that right?
2 A. Yes, that is right. Yes.
3 Q. We have also heard from Sir Kevin Tebbit that he was
4 handing out medals, I think, for HMS Nottingham and
5 saving her from sinking. We have also heard you were
6 not at that meeting at 11.45.
7 A. No.
8 Q. So how was the Ministry of Defence, as it were, dealing
9 with the personnel issues at that stage?
10 A. By then, because of the contacts, in particular with
11 David Omand, who also has personnel responsibilities for
12 the Cabinet Office, obviously these are discussions that
13 are taking place in Government and not simply involving
14 a particular department.
15 Q. But if we look, for example, at MoD/1/41, this is the
16 letter that Sir David Omand had written. It is
17 misdated, we now know this. It is written to
18 Sir Kevin Tebbit, in which he deals with what the
19 situation was over the weekend:
20 "The Prime Minister subsequently saw your letter ...
21 "The Prime Minister asked for a deeper analysis ...
22 "Your follow up letter has also been seen by the
23 Prime Minister ... The Prime Minister concluded that
24 notwithstanding the further circumstantial details in
25 your second letter he agreed with your recommendation...

55
1 "We agreed that you will circulate the detailed
2 account ..."
3 It was all being written, as we understood it, to
4 the Ministry of Defence because they were in charge of
5 the personnel side. But it rather looks like at the
6 Tuesday morning meeting there is no-one from the
7 Ministry of Defence actually taking an active role in
8 it; is that fair or unfair?
9 A. Well, I think as a matter of fact it must be fair,
10 although, as I understood it, Kevin Tebbit did come back
11 from Portsmouth before that meeting concluded. So
12 I thought that he was present for at least part of the
13 meeting and certainly was present in the course of
14 drafting material following on from that meeting.
15 Q. I think, in fact, as a matter of chronology, he was not
16 there at the first meeting which finishes at about 12.30
17 but arrives during the course of the second meeting
18 which started at 1.30. He arrived, I think we were
19 told, some time about 2 o'clock.
20 You had a meeting on 8th July with Mr Sambrook of
21 the BBC. Were you being told at all what was being
22 decided at the meeting at 11.45 in Downing Street?
23 A. Before I had the meeting with Richard Sambrook I was
24 certainly told that there was a proposal, I think from
25 David Omand, to contact the ISC and to use the ISC as

56
1 a means of perhaps persuading the BBC to reveal
2 privately their source and that, therefore, I should not
3 reveal the identity or the fact that Dr Kelly had come
4 forward. That was certainly a thought that I had had
5 before the meeting with Richard Sambrook.
6 I was very concerned that we had got into something
7 of a cul-de-sac with the BBC, that I needed to try and
8 find a way out of that cul-de-sac to take things
9 forward, and having a meeting with Richard Sambrook, who
10 I had written to on a number of occasions but never met,
11 seemed to me a possible way of moving things along, of
12 trying to improve relations with the BBC, particularly
13 as far as the Ministry of Defence was concerned, but
14 also to find a way in which if we could engage sensibly
15 in a proper discussion he might recognise he also had
16 a problem of a management kind, not being absolutely
17 sure he was getting all the right information from his
18 employees.
19 Q. You are rather warned off that because Sir David is
20 going to write to the ISC.
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. But when Sir David is writing to the ISC, were you told
23 the letter was going to be copied to the FAC and made
24 public?
25 A. I was aware that there was a proposal to use the ISC for

57
1 the kind of process that I have just described, trying
2 to find a way of identifying the single source and
3 persuading the BBC to explain who that was. I was also
4 aware, quite soon afterwards, that Ann Taylor did not
5 want the ISC to be used in that way, I think
6 specifically because that would have involved the
7 publication of material. I think, because of the reason
8 you are giving, it would have had to have been copied to
9 the Foreign Affairs Committee and therefore that would
10 have compromised the confidential way in which the ISC
11 operates.
12 LORD HUTTON: May I ask you, Secretary of State, when you
13 say that you understood that the ISC was going to be
14 enlisted as a means of persuading the BBC to reveal the
15 identity of the source, did you understand that there
16 was any thought that the ISC would go rather beyond that
17 and would examine Dr Kelly for the purpose of coming to
18 the conclusion that Mr Gilligan's main criticism was
19 incorrect? In other words, that Dr Kelly would tell the
20 ISC that he had not made the report to Mr Gilligan which
21 Mr Gilligan then broadcast. That would be a more direct
22 way of dealing with the matter, would it not?
23 A. When you say, my Lord, they were enlisted; I knew and
24 I was aware this was a proposal.
25 LORD HUTTON: I am not so much concerned with the word

58
1 "enlisted" or "a proposal", but what was the purpose?
2 Was the purpose more than to hope that the ISC would put
3 pressure on the BBC or persuade the BBC, or was it that
4 the ISC themselves would come to the conclusion that
5 Mr Gilligan's report, in its main thrust, was incorrect?
6 A. I was not present at that meeting, but what I understood
7 to be the case was that given the confidential way in
8 which the ISC operates, that by giving the name of
9 Dr Kelly to the ISC on our side might encourage the BBC
10 to reveal their source on their side, so that, in
11 effect, Ann Taylor became the person who was in
12 a position to identify the matching individuals if
13 indeed that was the case.
14 LORD HUTTON: Yes. Thank you.
15 MR DINGEMANS: Did you not say, at this stage, to
16 Sir David Omand -- was it Sir David Omand you spoke to,
17 who told you not to mention to Mr Sambrook the
18 possibility of the source at this stage?
19 A. No, it was not. I think it was simply a message from
20 Jonathan Powell to my private office. So the
21 information would have been relayed to me by my private
22 office.
23 Q. Did you not say at this stage: well, hang on a minute,
24 Dr Kelly has not yet admitted he is the single source,
25 for the reasons you have given before we are not going

59
1 to put his name in the public; if we start publicising
2 the fact someone has come forward it is going to create
3 a dreadful scramble to find out who he is before we know
4 he is the single source?
5 A. In the process I have just described to you, I was not
6 proposing to publish the name. The issue was passing
7 the name, as I understood it, in confidence to the ISC;
8 but there was no decision at that stage about
9 publication, as far as I was aware.
10 Q. Passing it in confidence, but making it plain, by
11 publishing the letter, that a name had been passed?
12 A. Well, I was not party to these discussions. I think it
13 is important that I do not go beyond what my knowledge
14 at the time was. My knowledge at the time was that
15 there was a proposal to use the ISC for the kind of
16 purpose that I had previously described to the Inquiry,
17 as a way of giving the BBC some confidence that its
18 source would not be compromised, in a way that assisted
19 both the Government and the BBC in identifying that
20 source properly.
21 Q. We know you have the meeting with Mr Sambrook. That
22 takes place at about 1.30. I think that is right.
23 A. Yes, it is.
24 Q. Is that at the Ministry of Defence?
25 A. No, it took place in my office in the House of Commons.

60
1 Q. Right. If we turn to MoD/1/52, although this is dated
2 10th July it is a note of what was said at the meeting.
3 You can see the discussions in paragraph 2:
4 "Mr Hoon briefly rehearsed why we were sure that
5 Mr Gilligan had not forewarned..."
6 You raised concerns in paragraph 3 that you had been
7 denied an opportunity to answer the story. Mr Sambrook
8 is reported as saying that there is a general issue
9 about over-defensiveness on the Today Programme.
10 At paragraph 4 you say that you have read with
11 interest Tom Baldwin's article in Saturday's Times and
12 say it had been suggested that Mr Sambrook was the
13 source of the story. Mr Sambrook said he had
14 met Mr Baldwin but had not gone beyond previous
15 descriptions.
16 We have also seen notes that the BBC made of the
17 same meeting. Can I take you to BBC/6/781? These are
18 handwritten notes that were produced -- sorry, in fact
19 that is a bad reference. It is BBC/6/140. 781 is some
20 other numbering.
21 This is Tuesday, July 8th. These are notes I think
22 Mr Sambrook has told us about. Can I just ask you about
23 a passage at page 143 where we can see, if you go down
24 the page:
25 "You will have read reports in The Times by

61
1 Tom Baldwin suggesting Gilligan was in the 100 plus team
2 in Iraq."
3 I think your note is obviously slightly more cryptic
4 in relation to that, but deals with it.
5 Can I then take you to page 144 where you say this:
6 "My view of Mr Gilligan is he is essentially
7 a tabloid journalist."
8 You gave an example and:
9 "Said something to the effect that Gilligan
10 shouldn't be on Today."
11 Mr Sambrook is reported to have said:
12 "He is a particular sort of journalist and we are
13 thinking about the appropriate use of him."
14 And he explained he was taken on because of previous
15 perceptions about reporting.
16 Now, at this stage you were obviously aware of
17 Mr Campbell's views about the BBC and his general
18 unhappiness with this. Was this part of continuing the
19 dispute with the BBC, as it were, by way of private
20 meetings?
21 A. No, on the contrary. As I think I indicated earlier, it
22 was my effort to try to find a way out of a particular
23 difficulty that had arisen with the Today Programme
24 I think actually I had done an interview that morning
25 with the Today Programme and that was one of the reasons

62
1 why it was useful to have the meeting with Mr Sambrook
2 that day. And the difficulty was that I felt quite
3 strongly that since the Today Programme had asserted and
4 John Humphrys had said that Andrew Gilligan's story had
5 been checked with the Ministry of Defence beforehand,
6 that I should have the opportunity of at least refuting
7 that.
8 Therefore, when the Today Programme asked me on more
9 than one occasion to appear, I said: yes of course
10 I would appear but I felt it was only fair that I should
11 have the opportunity of at least indicating that the
12 Today Programme had not in fact, and Andrew Gilligan had
13 not in fact checked the story. The problem with that is
14 that the Today Programme would not allow me on on that
15 basis and withdrew the invitations for me to appear.
16 But I could see that that was not necessarily
17 a healthy state of affairs either for me, the Government
18 or for that matter for the BBC. There were many issues
19 on which I should appear on the Today Programme and do;
20 and I wanted to try and find a way out of that
21 particular -- I think I described it earlier as
22 a cul-de-sac, and that is why I wanted to talk to
23 Richard Sambrook about a more sensible basis on which we
24 could move things along both, I hope, in the interests
25 of the BBC and in the interests of the Government.

63
1 Q. That meeting takes place at 1.30. We know that in the
2 course of the afternoon there is, as I think you have
3 already mentioned, a reply back from the Clerk to the
4 Intelligence and Security Committee saying they are not
5 very happy with the idea that they should have a public
6 letter and apparently suggest a press statement. Were
7 you told about that proposal?
8 A. No.
9 Q. Did you know that before the Ministry of Defence made
10 the press statement on 8th July that it was proposing to
11 issue a press statement?
12 A. Well, I was certainly aware that -- as I think I have
13 indicated -- there were a number of discussions taking
14 place about the best way of trying to persuade the BBC
15 to reveal its source. This was one option which, on the
16 morning of Tuesday the 8th July, those engaged in the
17 meeting preferred. It was not successful because of the
18 reluctance of Ann Taylor to become involved in the
19 process. Therefore, in effect, the fall back was for me
20 to write to the BBC and to publicise the fact that an
21 official had come forward.
22 Q. That was a fall back, suggesting someone had at least
23 a plan or a strategy. Whose plan or strategy was it, as
24 far as you understood?
25 A. It was something that had been discussed. It was

64
1 something I had discussed as long before as the Sunday
2 with Alastair Campbell. It was --
3 Q. Whose decision was it to implement that fall back
4 position?
5 A. I think that came out of the meeting on the Tuesday in
6 the Cabinet Office involving David Omand and others.
7 I simply -- I was given a message to the effect that it
8 was now appropriate for me to write to the Chairman of
9 the governors. Given that this is something that I had
10 wanted to do for some time, you know, I was certainly
11 willing to do that.
12 Q. So the implementation of the fall back plan you had at
13 least envisaged on the Sunday is coming to you from
14 No. 10, as it were?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. You do write a letter on 8th July. Can I take you to
17 that? That is MoD/1/66. You are writing "Dear Gavyn",
18 that is to the Chairman of governors.
19 "I am w