Issue 1981, UK Telegraph

Friday 27 October 2000

URL: http://www.telegraph.co.uk:80/et?ac=003707073259657&rtmo=pIlIUQ1e&atmo=gggggg3K&pg=/et/00/10/27/nbse427.html

The BSE inquiry was set up as a non-statutory inquiry, which meant it had no power to compel individuals to attend or supply evidence. Despite the lack of formal powers, it received "considerable assistance" from those it wanted to interview.

The final cost could reach £16 million. Adding the cost to Government departments of liaison units and legal support for witnesses would bring the total to £27 million. There were more than 600 witnesses, half of whom gave oral evidence.

The inquiry allowed witnesses to have legal representation. This was not purely for their benefit; lawyers helped the inquiry team by sifting through the documents and presenting relevant material at hearings.

The inquiry chairman, Lord Phillips, followed procedures by sending what are called "Salmon letters" to witnesses facing criticism. A Royal Commission into public inquiries chaired by Lord Justice Salmon had recommended in 1966 that witnesses should be given an opportunity to respond to possible adverse findings before they were published.

The BSE inquiry took so long that Lord Phillips, 62, received two judicial promotions as it continued. On his appointment in January 1998 he was Lord Justice Phillips, a member of the Court of Appeal. By January 1999 he was Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, a law lord.

That month, he was pressed into service when seven law lords were needed to re-hear the Pinochet case after Lord Hoffmann had sat while disqualified . In March Lord Phillips delivered a detailed opinion agreeing that the former dictator could be extradited to Spain.

In June this year he stepped down from the Lords to become Master of the Rolls. However, to give him time to finish writing his BSE report, another judge was asked to act in that capacity. It is only now that the courts are reclaiming one of their most promising judges.