David Kelly: The man who knew too much?

As we brace ourselves for another Prime Minister, it is a good time to remind ourselves of how Her Majesty's Government has operated in the past. This week will see the release of the long awaited Chilcot Report in to Britain's involvement in the Iraq war of 2003 which ultimately led to the downfall of Saddam Hussain and the commensurate rise of ISIS. The evidence upon which our then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, convinced MPs in the House of Commons has since found to be non-existent.

The Chilcot Report has cost a staggering £2.3 million and has taken a frankly amazing 7 years to be published. Already we have seen national newspapers reporting that instead of bringing Tony Blair to account, the report will instead be focusing on the potential human rights abuses of army personnel in Iraq. While the latter is quite proper if identified, it is extraordinary that a Prime Minister can effectively be exempted from making such a catastrophic decision based on a false claim.

On July 17th 2003, David Kelly, a government advisor on weapons of mass destruction was found dead in woodland and the Coroner's Report on the cause of death has been hotly disputed ever since. Kelly was quoted as saying to a colleague just days before that he would "probably be found dead in woodland". For the record, Kelly always denied the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Blair used weapons of mass destruction as the raison d'etre for a US/UK invasion. At the time of writing, there remains no evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

The legacy of that decision is here with us daily. ISIS sprang up on a wave of predictable extremism in response to the West going gung-ho in to Iraq. If that wasn't bad enough, Tony Blair was subsequently employed as a Peace Advisor in the region after leaving Gordon Brown to face the economic downturn in the UK.

We are about to witness one of the greatest cover-ups in British history and it is useful to remind ourselves of Tony Blair's response when asked if he had blood on his hands after the death of David Kelly. He gave no response.

Last week, Tony Blair entered the debate on Jeremy Corbyn's continued leadership of the Labour Party. The irony was not lost on me and I am in speechless at the temerity of the man. My then MP Chris Ruane voted in favour of the war in Iraq swayed no doubt by the persuasive argument of his then leader, Tony Blair. Having met Chris more than once, I very much doubt if he would have done so had he known the truth. Let this be a salutory lesson of what happens when elected representatives are not fully scrutinised. We all have a role to play in that both nationally and locally. The history books will not be kind to Tony Blair and  neither will they forget David Kelly - irrespective of what the Chilcot Report finds.