Key points: BBC's QC

Here are key points from the closing statements of Andrew Caldecott QC, Counsel for the BBC, on day 23 of the Hutton inquiry.

Mr Caldecott said there should be no doubt that the government's dossier on Iraq's weapons was a presentation of its case to its own people of possible grounds for war.

Andrew Caldecott QC

The dossier, as the prime minister had made clear, was a matter of trust, but in time "whispers of dissent were heard" in newspaper articles, which reported rows between the intelligence services and Downing Street.

Weapons expert Dr David Kelly had spoken to three separate journalists at the BBC about his concerns that the September dossier had been subject to "political interference", said Mr Caldecott.

He said the BBC did not present the criticisms as true, but it did present them as credible. "That broad judgment, the BBC defends as entirely right," said Mr Caldecott.

Dr Kelly's suggestion that he was closely involved in the preparation of the dossier was intrinsically credible.

The effect of all this media attention upon an extremely private and retiring man should not be underestimated Jeremy Gompertz QC Counsel for the Kelly family Key points: Kelly family QC

Mr Caldecott said Dr Kelly was not against war or against the dossier in principle. His quarrel was the emphasis of the dossier on the current threat posed by Saddam's actual weapons and with government interference. He cited the 45 minute claim as the classic example of this. He had no private agenda.

If the dossier exaggerated Iraq's position on chemical and biological weapons, it would have directly affected people like Dr Kelly who could expect to be asked to find them after any war, said Mr Caldecott.

Dr Kelly's evidence to the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) showed other UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (Unmovic) inspectors were concerned at the 45 minute claim because it did not fit any known Iraqi systems.

Mr Caldecott said Dr Kelly was also a principled man, and if he thought "the public were being misled, he would most likely have deeply resented it".

The government had no obligation to keep Dr Kelly's name secret, and Dr Kelly had no right to expect them to do so Jonathan Sumption QC Counsel for the government Key points: Government's QC

BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan did set out to test the credibility of what Dr Kelly had told him during their meeting.

Mr Gilligan identified "striking inconsistencies of language within the September dossier" and noted the 45 minute claim, after hitting the headlines, retired "into the shadows".

Mr Caldecott said with hindsight, Mr Gilligan's 6.07am broadcast on BBC Radio 4's Today programme should not have been unscripted and did not distinguish enough between what Dr Kelly had said, and the reporter's interpretation of what was said.

Dr Kelly did say the dossier was sexed up by Alastair Campbell and that people in intelligence were not happy with the 45 minute claim.

The BBC accepts Downing Street should have been notified about the broadcast on the evening before.

Mr Caldecott said the tape recording made by Newsnight reporter Susan Watts of her interview with Dr Kelly was highly informative about the scientist's misgivings, such as the 45 minute claim being got out of all proportion after Downing Street's intervention.

There was not "a whisper of challenge from the government to this programme", said Mr Caldecott.

They did not like Andrew Gilligan and set out to get him Heather Rogers Counsel for Andrew Gilligan Key points: Andrew Gilligan's Counsel

Alastair Campbell, the government's outgoing director of communications, could have pursued a complaint with the Programme Complaints Unit of the BBC or the Broadcasting Standards Commission.

Mr Caldecott said Mr Campbell "went strategic" at his Foreign Affairs Committee hearing when he said the BBC allegations were lies.

Mr Campbell's letters to Richard Sambrook, the BBC's head of news, and Greg Dyke, the corporation's director general, demanding answers to a raft of questions were "a stampeding tactic" that was not a dignified way for a government to behave, or the action of someone interested in compromise.

Mr Campbell's allegation in his first letter that the BBC was wrong to say the 45 minute intelligence was single source had been shown to be 100% true, said Mr Caldecott.

The BBC in hindsight accepts Andrew Gilligan's notes should have been examined before replying to Mr Campbell, but the communication chief's public attack had gone way beyond the 6.07am broadcast.

Mr Caldecott said the BBC governors had no obligation to meet because there had been no formal complaint from the government.

The governors did not uncritically endorse the BBC's management, he said.

The BBC did not accept the attempt to diminish the importance of Dr Brian Jones [who managed the scientists in the Defence Intelligence Staff] who was probably the most senior and experienced intelligence official working on WMD.

Mr Caldecott said there had been a "gear change" in the language of the 45 minute claim following a minute to John Scarlett, chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) from Alastair Campbell.

Jonathan Powell, Downing Street's chief of staff, launched a further bid to change the dossier on 19 September, but "this was not cosmetic, it was substance".

Mr Caldecott said it had not been easy to piece together what had happened at the first planning meeting for the dossier on 9 September, which was chaired by Alastair Campbell "since it appears that in government, note taking is a forgotten art ... parish councils keep minutes, but not apparently the government when planning the unprecedented presentation of intelligence to the public".

Mr Caldecott said his points about the dossier shared a simple theme: "There is no reason not to be open if you have nothing to hide."

Despite the prime minister asking for people to produce evidence that the 45 minute claim caused disquiet in the intelligence community, a "strange coyness" prevailed when the evidence did become available.

Mr Campbell's evidence to the FAC that he looked at all the drafts of the dossier which showed the 45 minute claim had stayed the same, was "demonstrably wrong", said Mr Caldecott.

The truth was that if the drafts on the 45 minute claim had been produced, Mr Campbell's evidence would have been "wholly undermined", he said.

It was "wholly indefensible" that the government did not correct suggestions in newspapers saying the 45 minute claim referred to strategic missiles or bombs, when it was common knowledge within the government it referred to battlefield munitions.

Mr Caldecott said for the government "humble pie it seems is never on the menu..."

He said the BBC anticipated criticism of the 6.07am broadcast in particular and its treatment thereafter, but the corporation did ask the inquiry to have in mind the public interest in the remainder of its extensive coverage of Dr Kelly's concerns about the dossier.