Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Marcel Berlins: Why Hutton must not happen again
Lessons in law

Why Hutton must not happen again. Plus, the year's most creative - and crazy - lawsuits

Marcel Berlins
Tuesday February 3, 2004
The Guardian

· Let's just, for a moment, put aside what we feel about the contents of the Hutton report and look at the way the inquiry was conducted. Is it a template for future inquiries? There was one particularly interesting and innovative procedure. Separating the inquiry into two parts was, I thought, a good idea. The first stage established the basic facts and allowed the judge to identify the key players, those whose evidence might be contested and be the subject of criticism. The second, more combative, stage would allow lawyers for the various interested parties to cross-examine those witnesses. In fact I was disappointed by the relative timidity of much of the cross-examination and the final speeches.
But the main weakness of the procedure was that it was left to the judge to decide whom to recall. I was surprised that anyone thought that Tony Blair would come under much criticism in the final report; if he was in danger of that, Lord Hutton would surely have recalled him for the second stage.

Should the inquiry have been left to just one judge? There's a case for it if one of the objectives was speed, which it was. There's no doubt that having a panel of inquiry members slows things down. The disadvantage is that the inquiry is at the mercy of one person's approach, and there's no one to say "Hold on, isn't there another way of looking at this?" or to input some specialist knowledge (like how journalism really works).

The much welcomed part of the inquiry was how quickly and apparently fully (though we can't be totally sure of that) all the evidence - oral, written, on email - was put on the internet for all to see. That meant the public had access to just about everything that Lord Hutton had on which to base his decision. There was none of the usual "Perhaps the judge knows something we don't". That's an admirable development, and it did result in his findings being immediately opened up to informed criticism.

The inquiry also benefited from the fact that everyone relevant turned up - the judge had no power to compel them - and that a lot of money and technological resources were quickly made available, not always the case with public inquiries. So I return to my question: is this the way inquiries on matters of public concern should in future be conducted?

I don't think so. It only works where the issue at stake is narrow, precise and requires hearing relatively few witnesses. Not many issues of national concern and importance would be that enclosed. It wouldn't be suitable for inquiries such as those into Bloody Sunday, BSE, Arms to Iraq or the death of Stephen Lawrence - nor for any future investigation into why we went to war in Iraq.