[Media-watch] MPs attempt to impeach Blair over Iraq

[Sigi D]

Independent
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=586445

MPs attempt to impeach Blair over Iraq 

25 November 2004


Tony Blair has become the first prime minister in
nearly 200 years to face a formal attempt at
impeachment.

A group of MPs tabled a little-used motion yesterday
to trigger an investigation into claims that he was
guilty of "gross misconduct" in the run-up to war in
Iraq.

Celebrities critical of the war joined 23 MPs to call
for Mr Blair's impeachment in a motion calling for a
special committee to investigate his claims in the
months before the invasion. The authors Frederick
Forsyth and Iain Banks, the actors Susan Wooldridge,
Andy de la Tour and Corin Redgrave and the musician
Brian Eno visited the House of Commons to show their
support, along with Reg and Sally Keys, whose son
Thomas, 20, a soldier, died in Iraq last year.

Campaigners hope to secure a Commons debate on
impeachment, putting Mr Blair's claims about Saddam
Hussein's weaponry and the threat he posed under
further scrutiny.

Signatories to the motion include the former Tory
frontbencher Boris Johnson, the former Tory ministers
Douglas Hogg and John Gummer, Plaid Cymru's
parliamentary leader, Elfyn Llwyd, Paul Marsden, who
defected from Labour to the Liberal Democrats, and the
Respect MP George Galloway, who was expelled from the
Labour Party for his comments on Iraq. No Labour
backbenchers have signed the motion despite claims by
campaigners that several have privately expressed
their support.

Alex Salmond, leader of the Scottish National Party
and one of the signatories, said he was optimistic
that the Speaker, Michael Martin, would grant a
debate. "This is no gimmick," he said. "No speaker in
history has turned down a motion on impeachment for
debate. My estimation is that, given there are 23
names on the order paper, it will depend entirely on
the breadth and substance of support. The Speaker is
an extremely fair man and I have got every confidence
in his ability to judge that."

Another backer of the motion, Roger Gale, Tory MP for
Thanet North, said: "I doubt there's a single person
here that doesn't accept that Parliament was misled,
that the House was told there were weapons of mass
destruction when there were not and that the UK was 45
minutes from doom when it was not. What the committee
must establish is whether the Prime Minister knew
those things were false when he told the House of
Commons."

A source said: "If we had said in August that we would
have an impeachment motion on the order paper, people
would have laughed. It's there now and has been ruled
to be in order. Whatever the Speaker decides it will
be constitutionally important." 



		
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