Speaking in the House of Commons following the publication of the report “Lessons still to be learned from the Chilcot Inquiry” by the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, Jon Trickett MP, Shadow Minister for the Cabinet Office, said:

On Iraq, The British Cabinet, the overwhelming majority in the House, much of the media, three select committees, the civil service, the MOD and the security services all came to the same false conclusion, resulting in a disastrous military adventure and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people.

Subsequently there has been the predictable procrastination, prevarication and obfuscation which has failed to reveal the truth to the British people.

The select committee is clear that the Chilcot report has failed to allow them to answer the central question as to whether parliament was misled, leaving a gaping chasm in the credibility of the British establishment.

What a damning judgement.

I welcome the various recommendations in today’s report. But they are timid.

Does the chair agree with me that it will require root and branch trans formative change of our whole political structures and culture before we can honestly say that there will never be such a failure again?