INDEPTH: HUTTON INQUIRY
Key players
Justin Thompson, CBC News Online | Updated January 27, 2004
The British inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the death of weapons expert Dr. David Kelly began August 11, 2003. It's known formally as the Hutton Inquiry after its chair, Lord Hutton. The inquiry has peeled back layer after layer of the story, exposing how the government of Prime Minister Tony Blair and the British bureaucracy handled the secret intelligence on Iraq and then created a public dossier to justify an invasion. The inquiry also revealed that the government then designed a secret strategy to name Dr. Kelly, who had expressed his doubts about that dossier to two BBC reporters.
Lord Hutton granted standing at the inquiry to:
The British government.
The BBC.
Dr. Kelly's family.
The British Parliament
BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan.
BBC reporter Susan Watts.
Click below for a list of key personalities in the affair:
Alastair Campbell
Andrew Gilligan
Lord Hutton
Dr. David Kelly
Susan Watts
John Scarlett
Sir Kevin Tebbit
Alastair Campbell
Communications chief for prime minister Tony Blair
Age: 46
A former erotica author-turned communications guru, Alastair Campbell is considered one of Tony Blair's key advisors. Campbell has been vocal in criticizing Andrew Gilligan's BBC Radio report, which suggested he helped inflate claims about Iraqi weapons in order to justify going to war.
One week after Campbell took the stand at the Hutton Inquiry, he announced his resignation, saying he needed to spend more time with his family. No date was given by the prime minister's office for Campbell's departure and no successor has been named.
Before joining the Prime Minister's office, Campbell was a journalist (at one point he freelanced for the erotica magazine Forum) and was a newspaper editor by the age of 29. He did a stint at the Daily Mirror, at one point becoming the political editor, before becoming Blair's spokesman in 1994. Three years later Campbell was appointed press secretary to the prime minister when the Labour party - with Blair at the helm - swept to victory in the national election.
Andrew Gilligan
BBC reporter
Age: 35
Cited Dr. David Kelly as the primary source of his claim that the British government "sexed up" details in an Iraq weapons report it used to help justify waging war in Iraq. Gilligan's report, which aired in late May 2003 on BBC Radio 4's Today program, sparked an uproar over the British government's decision to go to war. In the report, Gilligan suggested the government deliberately over-inflated its estimates of Iraq's weapons stockpile. Testifying before an inquiry into Kelly's death on August 12, 2003, Gilligan said Kelly told him he was sure Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, but that intelligence had been embellished to heighten the threat.
Before joining BBC Radio 4 as defence and diplomatic correspondent for the Today program, Gilligan was defence correspondent for London's Sunday Telegraph newspaper.
See his bio (from the BBC Web site).
Lord Hutton
Inquiry chair
Age: 72
First called to the bar in Northern Ireland in 1954, one year after graduating with a BA in jurisprudence, Lord Hutton went on to practise law until 1979 when he was appointed Judge of the High Court of Justice. He held that post for nine years before becoming Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland. In 1997 he became Lord of Appeal in Ordinary, a position he continues to hold. According to the inquiry Web site, Hutton was chosen because he is considered "a man of integrity and independence, well qualified to conduct such an inquiry."
See his bio (from the Hutton inquiry Web site).
Dr. David Kelly
Microbiologist, former UN weapons inspector
Age (at death): 59
David Kelly is the man at the centre of the controversy over British government claims about Iraqi weapons. The long-time government advisor on defence issues is named by the BBC as being the main source of its story accusing the government of doctoring intelligence information to justify the war in Iraq. On June 11, Kelly told a parliamentary committee he spoke to a BBC reporter about the issue, but denied he was the source. Two days later his body was found in a wooded area in central England. Authorities say he killed himself.
Beginning in 1991 he worked as a weapons inspector in Iraq, within three years becoming a senior advisor on biological warfare. Before that, he did stints as head of microbiology for the British Ministry of Defence, and chief science officer at Britain's Natural Environment Research Council Institute of Virology.
Susan Watts
BBC Reporter
Susan Watts was the second BBC reporter who spoke with Dr. David Kelly. Watts had talked on the phone with Kelly occasionally for two years before his death, although they met in person only once at a Foreign Office "open day" in November 2002. Watts had three research conversations with Kelly in May 2003, one recorded on audio tape and two by shorthand.
She testified she felt under "considerable internal pressure" from BBC news management to confirm Andrew Gilligan's reporting. In her testimony Watts said Kelly told her that British and American claims about Iraq's weapon's capability were "spin."
Kelly had also mentioned Alastair Campbell in his conversation with Watts, but she chose not to report it because she considered it a "gossipy aside" from "a single source."
Watts criticized BBC management in her testimony and chose to hire her own lawyers, rather than be represented by the BBC. She is currently on maternity leave.
Before joining the BBC as science correspondent for Newsnight in 1995, Watts was a science correspondent for The Independent and a technology correspondent for New Scientist.
John Scarlett
Chair of the Joint Intelligence Committee
Age: 55
It was John Scarlett, Britain's top spy, who told the inquiry that Prime Minister Tony Blair's claim that Iraq could attack with weapons of mass destruction within 45 minutes came from a "single source." He also told the inquiry that the 45-minute estimate was consistent with other assessments the British had made of Iraq capabilities.
It was Scarlett who had "overall…responsibility" for the controversial Iraq dossier. Scarlett also said that it was doubtful that Kelly had access to the intelligence behind the dossier. Scarlett said that Kelly should have been subject to a "forensic" "security-style interview" to find out if he was the source of the leak. Recalled later in the inquiry, Scarlett said that while he may have received advice from Alastair Campbell, he remained in control of the dossier.
Scarlett joined Britain's Secret Intelligence Service, best known as MI6, in 1971. He speaks Russian fluently. Scarlett served in MI6 for 30 years. During that time was stationed in Nairobi, Paris and Moscow. When he retired in 2001, he was one of the five directors who ran the spy agency. After his retirement he was named to the Joint Intelligence Committee, which provides the British prime minister with a weekly intelligence assessment.
Sir Kevin Tebbit
Permanent Undersecretary, Ministry of Defence
Age: 57
Sir Kevin Tebbit is the top civil servant in the British Ministry of Defence. The last witness to appear before Lord Hutton, Tebbit testified that he was present at a committee meeting, along with Prime Minister Tony Blair, where the decision was made to "out" David Kelly to the media, not by releasing or leaking his name, but by confirming it if a reporter asked the right questions. He said that the government believed that if Kelly's name were made public, he would then rebut the suggestions in Andrew Gilligan's report that the dossier was "sexed up." He also said Kelly was not "under considerable pressure" from the Defence Department and insisted Kelly was treated "carefully and considerately."
Kevin Tebbit joined the Ministry of Defence in 1969, after graduating from Cambridge University. From 1979-1982 he was seconded to the diplomatic service and stationed at NATO headquarters in Brussels. He then transferred to the diplomatic service and served in the East European and Soviet Department, as head of chancery at the British Embassy in Turkey, and as director of cabinet for the NATO secretary general. From 1988 to 1991, including the first Gulf War, he was politico-military counsellor at the British Embassy in Washington. He held a number of senior posts in the British civil service from 1992 until he was appointed permanent undersecretary for defence in July 1998.
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 The National's Kelly Crowe looks at how the Hutton Inquiry has affected the reputation of the British government.
(Aug. 27, 2003. Runs 10:12)
Jennifer Welsh, a political scientist at Oxford University, spoke to The National's Kelly Crowe about Tony Blair and the Hutton Inquiry. This is an exerpt from that interview. Born in Regina, Welsh has also taught at the University of Toronto and Harvard University.
(Aug. 27, 2003. Runs 13:27)
 On The Current Anna Maria Tremonti talks about her interview with David Kelly that appeared on the fifth estate
(August 28, 2003. Runs 10:27)
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