Kennedy denies being unhappy

Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy has brushed aside reports that he is unhappy in his job in the wake of the Iraq war.

Mr Kennedy denied the claims, telling BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I read this with a degree of wry amusement... I just do not recognise the account that is apparently being given in certain quarters.

"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me."

Mr Kennedy also rebutted claims that he had been quiet after the end of the conflict, pointing out that he had raised the issue of weapons of mass destruction every week at prime minister's questions.

The Lib Dem leader was a high profile opponent of war in the run-up to military action, but dropped his anti-war campaigning and backed British troops once hostilities began.

A great mistake

Mr Kennedy told the programme that Tony Blair was undermining the public's trust by failing to give evidence to MPs about the basis on which he led Britain into war with Iraq.

Mr Kennedy told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: "The great failure here is quite frankly that the Prime Minister himself is not prepared to come forward and give evidence.

"Because at the end of the day you have got the Foreign Secretary (Jack Straw), who is elected and accountable to the House of Commons giving one version of events, you have got the unelected, unaccountable Alastair Campbell (Mr Blair's communications chief) giving a slightly different slant on things....

We need to know exactly what took place in terms of the dossiers that were produced, in terms of the integrity of those dossiers, to what extent was the intelligence information sexed up or not Charles Kennedy Lib Dem leader

"....and the person holding the ring in the middle of all of this, who I think could bring clarity to bear, is the Prime Minister himself, and yet this is what he refuses to do and I think it is a great mistake on his part.

"The longer he refuses all requests to appear before a committee of the House of Commons, the greater the case for an independent judicial inquiry becomes and that is why I think it is a mistake on his part and it is destroying trust in the office of Prime Minister, in himself, perhaps unnecessarily so.

"I think if we had an independent judicial inquiry it would have access to all relevant documentation, not all of that need be in public... a judicial inquiry would be able to bring to bear that degree of independence of thought that at the moment seems to be sadly lacking.

"I don't think that the House of Commons as an institution feels that there has been a satisfactory answer to many of the questions that are being raised.

"We need to know exactly what took place in terms of the dossiers that were produced, in terms of the integrity of those dossiers, to what extent was the intelligence information sexed up or not, and at the end of the day we do not have a satisfactory answer to this entire issue of weapons of mass destruction, well what was the basis on which we went into this conflict?"