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Soames denies cover-up on Gulf war syndrome

By Rachel Sylvester, Political Staff

27 February 1997

NICHOLAS Soames, the Armed Forces Minister, resisted calls to resign last night after being accused of presiding over a "cover-up" of the extent to which pesticides blamed for causing Gulf war syndrome were used in the conflict with Saddam HusseiA highly critical Ministry of Defence inquiry concluded that Parliament had been misled repeatedly about the use of organophosphate pesticides in the Gulf because of "serious flaws" in advice given to ministers.

Richard Mottram, permanent under-secretary at the MoD and author of the report, found that there had been a "fundamental failure of working practices".

The report, commissioned by Mr Soames last December, did not blame ministers but condemned civil servants and military staff who failed to act on information which they knew would "embarrass the department".

A number of officials and staff in the Surgeon-General's department now face disciplinary action after a further internal investigation. Mr Mottram refused to name those involved as it might prejudice any proceedings.

Labour accused Mr Soames of trying to hide behind junior civil servants and called on him to take responsibility for decisions made by his department. "Nicholas Soames has no alternative but to resign immediately," David Clark, shadow defence spokesman, Peter Viggers, a former Tory defence minister and member of the defence select committee, said: "There must have been some kind of cover-up." He told MPs it was baffling that "alarm bells were not ringing in Whitehall". He was "anxious that this should n Mr Soames refused to resign, saying he did not receive information about the use of pesticides until Sept 25 last year. "It is not good enough just to call for people's resignations," he told BBC Radio 4. "If I had wilfully or deliberately misled Parliam Under questioning by the defence committee, he said: "I don't believe there has been a cover-up in any sense. There have been very, very serious and fundamental failings in one division of the Ministry of Defence."

A Downing Street spokesman said John Major was firmly behind his minister. "What is certainly the case is there is absolutely no cover-up. That is an outrageous suggestion," he added.

Mr Soames commissioned the inquiry after he apologised to the Commons for misleading MPs about the widespread use of organophosphates in the Gulf war. Campaigners claim that they could have caused unexplained illnesses in more than 1,000 veterans.

Although he stressed to the Commons that no deception was intended, he admitted that MPs had been misinformed over the extent to which troops were exposed to harmful chemicals.

Mr Mottram was asked to investigate why wrong information had been given so often. His report found that staff received "a number of indications" in 1995 that "British troops might have obtained locally, and also used, some OP pesticides". This was not a Last June, it states, MoD employees knew that chemicals had been used "extensively" but "appropriate action was not taken." A background note, stating that "there might have been some limited purchase of OP pesticide by British troops from local sources" Archie Hamilton, defence minister in the Gulf War, dismissed accusations of a cover up as "absurd" and "the hysteria you get in the run up to a general election".

He told BBC Radio 4: "A minister is really only as good as the briefing he is given by his civil servants. One really can't be expected, as a minister, to know every detail of what happened."

Jonathan Baume, of the First Division Association, of higher civil servants, said "ministers are accountable and responsible for what goes on in their departments. Recently, politicians have suggested that's not how they want to proceed."

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