“We are determined,” Chilcot said at the end of evidence last year, “to remain firmly outside party politics. … [The] inquiry should not be used as a platform for political advantage.”
And then just days later: the inquiry would wait until after the general election to question “those ministers who are currently serving in the roles about which the committee wishes to question them.”
“The committee believes that only after the general election can these ministers [Gordon Brown, David Miliband, Douglas Alexander] give their evidence fully without the hearings being used as a platform for political advantage.”
However there were distinct sounds of platform-hammering around Westminster last night as Number 10 reportedly tipped off the Daily Mirror that Chilcot had written to Brown green-lighting a pre-election session for the PM.
The move comes after a number of witnesses including former defence secretary Geoff Hoon and top security official Sir David Omand told the inquiry Brown’s Treasury had either restricted or slashed their budgets, affecting their performance for the worse.
Chilcot panel said to be furious about the leak, although one can’t help feeling that shows a little political naivety. Apparently we can expect reference to overnight developments in a statement at the start of evidence.
I suspect the session may be better attended than was originally likely for our morning witnesses from DfID and the Treasury – so I’d better get going to grab my place. More later, and live Tweets at twitter.com/iraqinquiryblog from 10h00.