Inquiry hears Gilligan misled BBC managers

ANDREW GILLIGAN, the reporter at the centre of the row over the British Government’s Iraq weapons dossier, misled senior BBC managers over his contacts with weapons expert David Kelly, the inquiry into the scientist’s death was told yesterday.

BBC director of news Richard Sambrook said the journalist had insisted throughout the corporation’s row with the Government that he stood by his reporting of Dr Kelly’s claims.

However under cross-examination at the Hutton Inquiry, both Mr Gilligan and Mr Sambrook admitted key elements of Mr Gilligan’s reporting on the Radio 4 Today programme had been “incorrect”.

Mr Sambrook said it was almost a month after Mr Gilligan’s original broadcast on May 29 before he learned his source was not actually a member of the intelligence services.

Mr Gilligan also publicly apologised for informing MPs that Dr Kelly was the source of reports about the Iraq dossier by another BBC journalist, at a time when the corporation was still refusing to say whether he was their ‘mole’.

The inquiry also took evidence from the Ministry of Defence director of personnel Richard Hatfield who said Dr Kelly had no “veto” on his name being made public by the government.

Previously the inquiry received evidence that any statement about Dr Kelly would only be issued with his consent.

The inquiry is investigating how Dr Kelly apparently came to take his own life after being publicly exposed as the source for Mr Gilligan’s report claiming the Government had ‘sexed up’ the dossier to strengthen the case for war.

Before the inquiry for the second time, Mr Gilligan acknowledged he should not have said Downing Street ordered the claim that some Iraqi weapons could be deployed within 45 minutes be included in the dossier against the wishes of the intelligence services.

He also conceded he had made an “error” in saying during a live “two-way” with programme presenter John Humphrys that the ‘45-minute’ claim was included even though the government knew it was probably wrong.

“It was not intentional. It was a kind of slip of the tongue that does happen quite often during live broadcasts. It is an occupational hazard which is why it would have been better to have scripted them,” Mr Gilligan said.

“I regret that on these two occasions I didn’t report entirely carefully and accurately what he said. My error was to ascribe that statement to him when it was actually a conclusion of mine.”

However Mr Sambrook told the inquiry that on June 26, Mr Gilligan had helped draft a letter to Downing Street insisting he had “accurately” reported his source as saying the Government “probably knew the 45-minute figure was wrong” and that the claim was “questionable”.

Counsel to the inquiry James Dingemans QC said that the answer had been “wrong and unsupported by the evidence”.

Mr Sambrook replied: “As I now understand it, that is the case. At the time, Mr Gilligan told me that was a proper reflection of what his source told him.”

Mr Gilligan also acknowledged the statement in the letter had been “incorrect”.

“I have been trying to cast my mind back to remember exactly what I said about this and I cannot, but it is clearly wrong to say that,” he said.