My thoughts on today’s drama
1. Yates will be hopping mad if (as is believed) he recommended charges against Jonathan Powell and others. He may see this as the second time he’s been shafted by the establishment.
2. No criminality doesn’t mean no wrongdoing said Martin Bright, my counterpart at the New Statesman in a Week in Westminster episode we were both invited in for (broadcast tomorrow). Lord Hutton cleared the government of any wrongdoing. But the documents he released damned Messrs Blair and Campbell in the court of public opinion.
3. No one can now claim that Yates wasted time because we don’t know what he found. Yes, he took time. The fact that he investigated some people under conspiracy to pervert the course of justice – so he obviously felt he was being lied to. And obviously that would delay the investigation.
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