Not Yet Time for Iraq Inquiry, Says Straw

The justice secretary, Jack Straw, said today that an inquiry into the Iraq war would have to wait until British troops had "finished their work" in the country.

Straw, who was foreign secretary at the time of the invasion, reiterated the position of the prime minister, Gordon Brown, that there would be an inquiry, but not yet.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today program, he said that the safety of the 4,100 British troops still "in harm's way in Iraq" was more important than an inquiry.

Those troops "should not themselves be distracted by what would inevitably and understandably be a very significant argument about whether it is right or wrong for them to be present", he said.

He added: "It is our judgment - particularly the prime minister's and the foreign secretary's and the defence secretary's view - that the right time to look at these issues and review the lessons learned is when our troops have finished their work."

Straw was responding to calls for an inquiry into the war led by the Conservatives, who are planning to step up the pressure during an opposition day debate in the House of Commons today.

The shadow foreign secretary, William Hague, argued that unless an inquiry were held now, memories would fade and files and emails would go astray.

He said: "Now is the right time, because five years have passed since the beginning of the war. And, in fact, many of the key decisions will have been made before that, so you are now going back six years, or possibly more.

"There does come a point where you do have to get on with it."

Lessons learned could be applied in Afghanistan, he added.

But the Liberal Democrats accused the Conservatives of hypocrisy and have tabled an amendment to today's Conservative motion, calling for Labour and Tory MPs who backed the invasion to apologize.

A new website, www.holdthemtoaccount.com, will draw renewed attention to those politicians who backed the deployment of troops just over five years ago.

The Lib Dem foreign affairs spokesman, Ed Davey, said: "For the Tories to demand an inquiry into the Iraq war is like Ronnie Biggs wanting an inquiry into the Great Train Robbery."

He added: "It is flattering that the Conservatives have come round to our long-held belief that there must be a full inquiry into the war as soon as possible.

"However, it would have greater strength if they admitted the key role they had in letting this disastrous decision be made in the first place."

Straw said there had already been a "very substantial inquiry" into intelligence failures leading up to the war.

Asked whether the war had been a success or a failure, he said: "Historians will come to that judgment. The answer to your question will depend, in time, on how things work out in Iraq."

He insisted the government had been "justified in making the decision on the basis of the information before us at the time".

Straw is due to announce plans to reform the way parliament operates later today, with a draft constitutional renewal bill which may limit the power of the prime minister to declare war.

Other matters that may be covered in the proposals include allowing parliament the final decision on when an election is called and giving the Commons more of a say in the selection of public officials.