Üjf199ÝOral evidenceÌTaken before the Northern Ireland Affairs CommitteeÊÈon Monday 16 March 2009ÌÜel3ÝÈÜjf27ÝMembers present:ÌÜjf27ÝSir Patrick Cormack, in the ChairÌÜjf55ÝMr John GroganÈMr Stephen HepburnÈLady HermonÈDr Alasdair McDonnellÌMr Denis MurphyÈStephen PoundÈDavid SimpsonÌÜjf22ÝÜjf50ÝÜcf2ÝWitnesses: Ücf3ÝMr Michael GallagherÜcf1Ý, Chairman, and Ücf3ÝMr Godfrey WilsonÜcf1Ý, the Omagh Bombing Victims and Survivors Group, gave evidence.ÌÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ1 Chairman:Ì Could I welcome you both. We were expecting four of you, but you are most welcome, Mr Gallagher and Mr Wilson. This is a public evidence session, as you know. In other words, everything will be taken down and there will be a published transcript. For that reason, if you feel at the end that you want five minutes with the Committee in private we will be very happy to grant that facility to you. Could I say at the beginning in welcoming you that I do not think I need to tell you how much the Committee is in sympathy with you and those you represent. The purpose of this afternoon's session is for us to ask you questions and for you to give whatever answers you wish. I hope you will appreciate that we can make no comment this afternoon on such issues as a public inquiry. The Committee will deliberate after we have had your evidence. This must not be taken as being a statement either for or against that particular subject. We will question you on it, but because of what has appeared in the papers I did not want you to think that we would be in a position to make any comment on that this afternoon because when we go back we shall want to deliberate in Committee on what you have said. We have invited Mr John Ware to give evidence before us and we may invite others also to give evidence before us. That merely sets the scene for you and I hope is helpful. Before I begin any questioning, is there anything that either or both of you would like to say to the Committee?ËÜjf65Ý16 March 2009	Mr Michael Gallagher and Mr Godfrey WilsonÌËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Could I just say, first of all, that we welcome the opportunity to come here and talk to you firsthand about something that is very important to us in our lives. I do recognise that you are the people who are asking the questions, but I have got an executive summary and it may be useful if I read it. It gives an overview of many of the problems that we have encountered over the past 10 years. I have got a couple of copies of that statement so that the note taker does not need to go on overtime to keep pace, if that is agreeable with you, Sir Patrick?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ2 Chairman:Ì Is this a long statement, Mr Gallagher?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý I do not think it is long. It is nine pages.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ3 Chairman:Ì That is a bit too long to give as a statement, if you do not mind my saying so, because that is going to take you a good 12 minutes or so to read. If you could just make a few comments and then we can go on to our questions. Please leave that with us as additional evidence so if any of the points are not covered in the questioning we have that, but if we have a very, very long statement from you it cuts down the amount of questioning we can have. What I suggest is if you want to make some of your main points and then leave that with our clerk and I promise you we will take every item in that statement most carefully into account. Please feel free to refer to it at any time during your evidence and in your opening comments. If Mr Wilson has any opening comments he wishes to add, please feel free.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý As you know, the reason we are here is as a result of a tragic event that happened on 15 August 1998. Our only son, Aiden, died in that atrocity and Godfrey's daughter, Lorraine, who was 16 at the time, died in the bomb. I can remember sitting on the 16th thinking, Well, everybody knows who is responsible for this and there is so much goodwill right across the country, everybody is saying this is such a small grouping, they are renegades and out of control". I never would have imagined that I would be sitting here over 10 years after the event trying to persuade people that we need closure. We came together as a group of bereaved families almost immediately. Some of the families I knew personally and some of them I had never known before. We did come together as a group of people and very shortly formalised ourselves into the Omagh Support and Self-Help Group. We were people from right across the community. Certainly I had never been a member of a political party, I had been a self-employed person and had cut my own rut in life, as it were. I did not necessarily need to be thrust into this, but it was my own choosing to be thrust into this because on 3 June 1984 my youngest brother was assassinated by the Provisional IRA so I felt that I could not sit back and let two wonderful people's lives connected with my family count for nothing, there had to be a stand taken. It was for that reason that I took on the particular role that I did. The Group itself is made up of people from right across the community, people of all religious and political opinion. Indeed, one family is Mormon. We have a meeting usually once a month. We have set up a management committee. We are in a formal structure and are a registered charity. When we have those meetings we do not ask anyone to leave their politics or religion outside the door, but we tend to concentrate on the things that unite us rather than the things that divide us, and that is a quest for justice. Of course we supported the police, we supported the Garda S–«ocha«na and all the apparatus of state, the intelligence services, Ücf2Ýet ceteraÜcf1Ý, but after a couple of years it became clear there were serious problems in the Omagh investigation and we went from one crisis to another. The documents that I have handed over graphically illustrate a lot of the problems we have had over the years on both sides of the border.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ4 Chairman:Ì Could you just give us one or two examples of that. I appreciate you have given a number in the document which will be circulated, but if you could just give us one or two examples that would be both helpful and interesting.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý In 2002 we saw Colm Murphy convicted for his part in the Omagh bombing. Ironically, it was the result of a television programme that John Ware made entitled Ücf2ÝWho Bombed Omagh?Ücf1Ý that was the catalyst for that. He identified a number of individuals who were alleged to have been involved in the Omagh bombing and Colm Murphy was one of those people that John Ware actually confronted in Dundalk. As a result of the light being shone on him, if you like, the Garda looked more closely and he was convicted in 2002. In 2005 he appealed the conviction. Two of the Garda officers lied consistently in the witness box_those were the words of the presiding judge_and as a result of that his conviction was quashed and he is awaiting a retrial. That is a very long time to await a retrial. Omagh is riddled with things that it is very hard to understand. We were confused and really did not know where to look. There were no convictions on the horizon in Northern Ireland. We decided to take a civil action, and both Godfrey and I are involved in that civil lawsuit. It will not put people behind bars but it will apportion blame. The court can apportion blame. There are five people involved in that, five people who are alleged to have participated in the Omagh bombing, and also the organisation, the Real IRA. Our legal team, Lord Brennan, is making the closing speeches this Friday. That was one direction where we went as families. Some of the other families chose not to take that direction.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ5 Chairman:Ì How many families are in your group?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý It is always a difficult thing to quantify. I would say that probably more than half of the bereaved families. Our membership stands at around 200. It is difficult to quantify how many people are involved in the Group because people drift in and out. Some people who were initially involved in the Group have left and that tends to be what happens, maybe their needs were met and they have moved on in a different direction. What I can say is we are very representative of the people affected by the bomb, both in the bereaved and injured.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ6 Chairman:Ì Could you tell us what you are currently doing to support individual families, bereaved families, 10 years after the event?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Of course. In the Group we have a registered office. We moved to a new office which is quite close to the bomb scene and I feel that was a very positive move because people have moved closer to the bomb scene. The charity shop involves people and brings people from the community into the shop and it also gives the people in the Group an opportunity. If I could just say what our objectives are. They are the relief of poverty, sickness, disability of victims, the advancement of education and protection. These are things from the charitable side. If I could go to the activities: The above objects are reflected in the work of the Omagh Support and Self-Help Group: advice, advocacy and support". We have a welfare advisor, somebody who advises on welfare issues, because when you get an horrific incident such as that you get many people who are dependent on benefits for a long time and, indeed, some people for the rest of their lives. From that point of view, we have someone who comes in and assists with form-filling and advises people on what benefits they are entitled to, a benefit check if you like. We do IT training courses because many of the people had their education disrupted as a result of being affected by the bomb and, indeed, some people would have had no IT training whatsoever, including myself. We run computer training courses at two different levels, for beginners and advanced. We run a programme of complementary therapies where people get various types of complementary therapy. One of the big projects that we are running, and have run for the past three years, is an archive of historical material. We felt it was important to collate all of the information possible, both in the written media and the transmitted media, the broadcast media, and to that end we have the archive project, which is a very big project. We have a website and we have an archive on that website that is updated constantly. There are people working all the time on the archive. We are doing exactly what we are doing here now, lobbying for change for victims. We do youth work and we have a youth section to the committee where young people take part, they run their own sub-committee. We have advice and information for carers on how to support people who are looking after people who are injured. The work can vary. For the last three months we have had an art class that runs every Wednesday night and people come in and do a whole programme of different types of art: water painting, glass painting, interior design. It is quite varied, it depends at any one time. All of the services that we provide to our members we try to gain funding for so it allows people who have a limited budget to take part. There are some very enjoyable things that the Group does. We have social outings where we arrange to go to the theatre or go and visit National Trust properties or just have a day at the seaside. The programme is quite varied.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ7 Chairman:Ì That sounds very impressive. You are obviously devoting an enormous amount of your personal time to this.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Almost 10 years, without pay.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ8 Chairman:Ì Without pay.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Without pay. We only have one and a half people working in the Group who receive pay. One is a young woman called Donna McCauley who is our Project Co-ordinator who works from nine o'clock to 5.30 who runs and organises many of these programmes. We have another lady who comes in and does the admin.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ9 Chairman:Ì This is all greatly to your credit and it is helpful to have that background. Since we met informally in Omagh in the late October of last year we have had the publication of the Sir Peter Gibson Report. Could you give the Committee your reaction to that?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý We had grave concerns about Sir Peter Gibson dealing with this matter. The Group has been here before because in the Republic in 2002 there was a similar accusation made that the Garda mishandled intelligence and as a result of that the Government set up a team called the Nally team and they interviewed witnesses and carried out an investigation into these allegations. The problem that we had was they were three key former top civil servants in the Irish Republic and we felt they did not have the independence from the Government that was needed, they had no investigative skills to carry out this work and when their work was completed, like Sir Peter's, it was a document that it was feared if it went into public circulation could assist terrorists. We felt we were going to be back here, as it were, people talking about things. We had one hand tied behind our back. We had very limited knowledge. We got a document that was released by Sir Peter, and I cannot remember the exact number of pages but it was not much more than the statement I was going to read here at the beginning of this meeting, and we do not know how many pages were in the report that the Prime Minister or others received. In fact, I wrote a letter to Sir Peter asking for the terms of reference of his inquiry and I never even got an acknowledgement or a reply. We do not even know that. If I could put it very succinctly: he used a particular line of language to indicate that to track the movement of people in cars in 1998 was not possible and yet we have seen the government experts and private companies, telephone companies, give similar evidence in our civil action in front of the court with diagrams and described how you can track the movement of a phone. They are not saying they can_the word has been used in this report_pinpoint". Of course they could not pinpoint a mobile phone, but what happens is when a mobile phone moves between transmitting stations it logs off one and logs on to another, so if you can calculate the time it logged off one and logged on to the other you can give a fairly precise location of where that vehicle has been, the direction and speed that it is travelling. I am very reluctant to speak in detail about this subject because I am aware that John Ware is talking about it on Wednesday and he has a greater knowledge of the subject than I do. The concern that I have is the Prime Minister, the Taioseach and even the President of the United States got involved in some way in this investigation at the earlier stage, they indicated there should be a resolution to it and that the perpetrators should be brought before the courts. For that information to have been available, and do not forget in Sir Peter's report it does not say that the movement of the vehicles and telephone numbers were not known, that should have been passed at the earliest possible stage to the senior investigating officers. That is the concern I have got, that it took the RUC almost nine months trawling through millions of telephone billing records in order to achieve the telephone numbers that literally if the intelligence services had co-operated, policemen, let it be RUC or Garda, could have put their hand on the shoulder of the people on that very evening.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ10 Chairman:Ì Mr Gallagher, I want to bring in Mr Simpson, but before I do so, just so that we are absolutely clear on this, you are saying that in spite of Sir Peter's report and your subsequent meeting with the Prime Minister you still remain very unhappy on this subject? That would be a correct interpretation, would it?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý I think there are a number of key issues that have not been answered stemming from Sir Peter's report.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì Thank you very much. If, by chance, those issues do not come up in questioning this afternoon then you and Mr Wilson can of course supplement your evidence by writing to our clerk and we will be able to have that as well.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ11 David Simpson:Ì Can I start off by thanking the two gentlemen for their presentation. Right across the board in Northern Ireland they will have a lot of sympathy. They have to be congratulated on their persistence as an organisation in the past 10 years. I was going to comment that we know exactly how they feel but I think that would be a wrong comment because we do not know what the families went through in Omagh and for any families caught up in victim-hood in any shape or form it is a tragedy and our hearts go out to them. I do not know if you are in a position to answer this, but I will put it to you anyway. If you were to put the blame at the door of someone for the failure of conviction, and we have, of course, the Garda, the police, the judiciary and politicians, who would you blame for the failure of not achieving your goals to this present day?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý I think you are quite right in your opening comments. I feel it would be wrong of me to place the blame on anyone and that is why we do need the inquiry. There is one thing I want to make clear at the beginning of this conversation. We will not remove the blame from those who are responsible, and that is the Real IRA. They took responsibility for it. They are the people who created an extremely lethal and dangerous situation in Omagh and expected others to deal with it. Our call for an inquiry is not to shift blame from those who rightly should receive that blame, but to see what went wrong and what should be done to put it right. The problem is that we live in an environment in Northern Ireland, and I know I can say it in this room, where whenever any of these questions are asked people will always say in relation to Omagh, Well, that is a security issue". As far as we are concerned, the security failed at the point when the bombers closed the car door and it then became a public safety issue. I have a substantial file, I do not know if it is appropriate to leave it with you or not, but it covers a vast amount, a vast area, including town centre evacuation and emergency planning. One of the reasons that it is important to have an inquiry into these types of things is I have three summarised versions of reports that were carried out. The first one is into the Oklahoma City bombing and that occurred on 19 April 1995. It was a bombing without a warning. It was home-grown terrorism. There was no warning call. As a result of that, seven different inquiries were carried out into a whole range of organisations and how they performed. It is a fascinating piece of work. You can get this on the internet. As a result of this work the Federal Emergency Management System was set up, which is a system where, whether it be a national disaster or a terrorist act is committed, there are resources from a whole range of states that come and assist those in trouble. As a result of the Oklahoma City bombing that system was set up and people benefited on 9/11. People got on a plane, a train or whatever and went to where it was. The other report that I have got is a report on a terrorist attack that happened in Saudi Arabia at a place called Khobar Towers, and it is entitled Ücf2ÝA Personal Accountability for Force ProtectionÜcf1Ý. This was a US military base that a truck bomb was planted outside and 19 US Marines died. As a result of that, the US Government wanted to know why 19 of their young men, along with a number of Saudi Nationals died, Could we have done more to prevent that?" As a result of that, they carried out a very extensive inquiry. It is a fascinating read. When you start to read this, some of the things are exactly the same as Omagh. As a result of what happened the base commander was returned to the United States, it was recommended that he would never be in a position where he would be accountable for people's personal safety and it was recommended he would receive no further promotion, along with a number of recommendations for US bases at home and abroad. These are the positive things that come from an inquiry. Going back to the most basic one that I can always remember, the Ücf2ÝTitanicÜcf1Ý, as a result of the Ücf2ÝTitanicÜcf1Ý every ship that sails today has enough lifeboats for the people on that ship. We get a bit screwed up when we talk about inquiries. The other one is the bombing of the US Embassies in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. This was a bomb that occurred on 7 August 1998, just a week before the Omagh bombing. They carried out an inquiry to see what weaknesses and strengths there were in the protection against terrorism at their bases, their embassies, their establishments both at home and around the world. That is the reason why it is important to carry out an inquiry.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ12 Chairman:Ì May I just stop you there because you have made a very important series of points. You will know that when this Committee reported on the cost of policing the past we said that we did not feel there should be more public inquiries unless there was really broad consensus amongst all the political parties in Northern Ireland because of the time that they take and their vast cost. Both of those are very significant factors. The Bloody Sunday Inquiry has been going on and on and on and we have recently had a further delay. By the time Lord Saville reports we will have had an expenditure in excess of #200 million. Largely because of this the recent consultative group, Eames-Bradley, has come down rather against further public inquiries in its very important and thoughtful report. What sort of inquiry is it that you want and how do we get over_please do not read anything into what I am saying_these very real points of cost and duration?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Sir Patrick, this is something that we face daily. You are absolutely right, I am appalled at the cost of inquiries and the fact that QCs and law firms end up millions to the better from our pain. At the inquest in 2000 I was one of the few people who did not instruct my solicitor to take part in that because the question at the coroner's inquest was how somebody died. I did not need an inquest to tell me how Aiden died, I knew how he died. The law firms had some of the highest paid QCs in this country at the inquest. It sat for three weeks and deliberated and at the end of that process I do not think we gained an awful lot. I am not in favour of dragging this out and costing hundreds of millions of pounds. Whilst you have quoted me the worst example of a public inquiry, let me tell you that Dublin is probably the European capital of public inquiries. They call them tribunals. Some of them have equally been a disaster and very expensive, but some have worked very well. In fact, people have even gone to jail as a result of some of those inquiries. Could I just point to an inquiry that took place in London and I did not hear anyone talk about the cost or the length of it, and that was the Hutton Inquiry into the death of the Government scientist, Dr Kelly. The issues that had to be dealt with in that inquiry were as sensitive as the issues to be dealt with in this inquiry. The witnesses were from the Prime Minister down, intelligence services and committees that I had never heard of were involved in that. This is a unique inquiry because it is cross-border. There must be somewhere in Europe where there has been a cross-border inquiry. There must be a template for this somewhere. The families are not interested in bankrupting the British Treasury, that is not part of our mission here. What we need is closure. We will co-operate with the Government to look at ways of minimising the cost of an inquiry and reducing the time.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ13 Chairman:Ì What particular things would you expect the inquiry to look into? You have been very clear and unequivocal in saying you know who to blame, the Real IRA, for this despicable, appalling crime, for which none of us can find adequate words of condemnation, but what would you hope the inquiry would deliver up?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Obviously we would look at the intelligence that was there prior to the bomb. You asked me earlier on to highlight some of the deficiencies that we have had to face over the 10 years. There was an American agent called David Rupert who worked for the FBI initially and then was jointly controlled by the FBI and MI5. In April 1998 David Rupert communicated with his handlers via email. He was a very prolific emailer and sent almost 4,000 emails in his period of operation in Ireland. I have seen every one of those emails. In April 1998 he did say in the circle that he had access to that Omagh was considered to be a serious target because of its police and military installations. That message never got through to the RUC. In fact, Sam Kincaid, the Assistant Chief Constable, told us in February 2006 in Omagh that they had just learned of this information, it had never been shared with the RUC. I am sure people who served in the RUC would want to know why that information was never shared. We would like to know because it put Omagh, as it were, in the firing line. In Sir Peter's statement he says there was no indication that Omagh was a target in August 1998, but I would suggest there were quite a number of indicators that suggested that Omagh was a target. There was a phone call on 4 August 1998 to the police station in Omagh saying that there was going to be a terrorist attack on 15 August 1998. The police themselves investigated this and later the Police Ombudsman investigated it. He has not yet made his formal report on it but I am aware that the report is inconclusive. A Special Branch officer was the key person who was alleged to have made the phone call and it is my understanding that officer has now been cleared. The families cannot understand how somebody 11 days before the Omagh attack made a 15-minute phone call to the police station in Omagh, said there was going to be a terrorist attack on 15 August and that was what did happen on 15 August. When the McVicar Review, which reviewed the Omagh bomb, learned about this and asked for the serious threat book, which is the book in every police station which records serious threats, the book for the period of August 1998 was missing. The documents were there prior to and after August. It was in the station commander's desk. There has been little or no explanation and it has never been found. There are so many anomalies that need to be addressed. In this file I have given you, I find it very difficult off the top of my head to quote all of the incidents.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ14 Chairman:Ì One would not expect you to be able to do that. I understand that. You have got something there Mr Wilson wanted to draw your attention to.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Godfrey is also stating, and quite rightly so, that Omagh was not an isolated incident. Up to that point there were 29 terrorist attacks right across Northern Ireland from Belfast to the most north-westerly point administered from Belfast, which is Belleek. On 1 August 1998 a bomb exploded at Bambridge. The recognised codeword of the Real IRA, which was Marda Pope, was used in that incident. There was a serious terrorist attack at Lisburn city centre but the device failed to investigate and, again, the codeword was Marda Pope. I am not blaming the police on duty in Omagh that day, but when all of these factors are put together you ask the question why when that word was used on 15 August 1998 in the Omagh incident room did the red lights not go off? There were two Land Rovers with DSMU officers inside ready to deploy to Kilkeel in County Down on public order duties. I think there was an Orange demonstration and they were there to make sure there was no trouble. They were sitting in the Land Rovers, they heard the radio traffic, the police on the ground trying to clear the street and at that initial point there were something like four officers. They made themselves known to the people in the incident room and they told them to stay where they were, but on their own initiative they did go into the town and help to evacuate, but sadly it was too late to make a difference. There are so many anomalies that a public inquiry needs to address.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Wilson:Ücf1Ý This is a statement by Sir Peter. He states: In August 1998, security forces across Northern Ireland were alerted to the risk of terrorist attacks, but not to the fact of any particular town at immediate risk. It is to be noted that the attacks referred to in the previous programme were all in towns to the south-west of Belfast, well distanced from Omagh. There was no obvious reason why Omagh should be attacked."ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ15 Chairman:Ì Yes, this is Sir Peter.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Wilson:Ücf1Ý Surely when the threat was across Northern Ireland all stations should have been on alert.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì Point noted.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ16 Lady Hermon:Ì Sorry I was a few minutes late coming into the room. Mr Gallagher, we have met on a number of occasions where you have spoken with great dignity and great patience about what has been a very personal loss to you and to other families. I have heard a view expressed saying that the Ücf2ÝPanoramaÜcf1Ý programme was probably very upsetting to the Omagh families. Was that actually how you found it or did you find the Ücf2ÝPanoramaÜcf1Ý programme helpful?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Lady Hermon, what I would say is after what happened on 15 August, sadly it takes a lot to shock the families. We are always saddened to hear that there are deficiencies which could have made a difference either to prevent what happened or to catch the culprits. I and some of the other families have worked with John Ware over the years and have found him somebody who always put the best interests of the families to the forefront. As I said earlier, it was his programme, Ücf2ÝWho Bombed Omagh?Ücf1Ý, which put Colm Murphy in the dock. He is always working from the point of view of good intent. You are always shocked and obviously the thought is what could have been, and that is a very difficult thought. This is why I feel a public inquiry is important. Ten years ago there were certain people in the Garda, RUC or intelligence at that time who had certain loyalties but, as time has moved on, those loyalties with new people coming in are not as strong. For example, new people coming in and seeing something on a file say, I am not taking responsibility for this. I should talk about it". For that reason we feel there will be revelations to come. Have everything put on the table, let us know all of it and let us deal with all of that and then we can get on with our lives. I have got a life at the moment, and I know for many other families it is the same, which is suspended. It was suspended on the afternoon of 15 August 1998. I know what I have done over the past 10 years has been my own choosing to some extent but I feel I had to do what I have done. I would not like to go through the rest of the life that I have left being known as the father of Aiden Gallagher who died in the Omagh bomb. I want to have some life of my own. I want to go and do things. I do not take any comfort from doing these things, I just feel I have no choice, although in some senses I do have a choice. It is important to get everything out. Let us get all of that dealt with and, as I said earlier, not drag it out for years, not cost millions of pounds. We are in a trap here. What I asked the Prime Minister to do was to help bring closure to the Omagh families, that is what we are asking, help us bring closure.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ17 Lady Hermon:Ì Did the Prime Minister give you an indication, Mr Gallagher, that in fact there would be closure while he was Prime Minister?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý He did not, but I did not expect him to do that in all honesty. I did feel that he was a very genuine and sympathetic person, but I felt there were certain constraints on the Prime Minister.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ18 Lady Hermon:Ì Such as?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý There are people who will be saying, You have got to think of national security here. You have got to think if we go down the road of exposing all of our techniques the terrorists will gain from our knowledge". The tragedy of this is we support the intelligence services, we understand the reasons why they do things, we understand more than most, but we feel that we need closure. I cannot walk away and say, Well, it was just one of those things", it was not just one of those things. What brought it home to me was last week or the weekend before last when we had two young soldiers who were gunned down for no reason whatsoever and a policeman who gave 20 years' service to the community who had everything to live for, his family and to enjoy his retirement, just for somebody to make a political point. This is why I do what I do. It is not to weaken the system, it is to strengthen the system. If we are seen in some sense to be bashing the police, we are only bashing the police and intelligence services so that they will bash the people who do these things, that is where we want to make a difference.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ19 Chairman:Ì There is this conflict, is there not, between needing the closure, wanting to feel that everything that can be done has been done, and, on the other hand, the necessary protection of the police and security services. That, in a way, was why the Prime Minister asked Sir Peter to conduct the inquiry that he did. Have you sat down with Sir Peter and been through his report with him?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý You are absolutely right, that was what Nula O'Lone did but she made a very damning report on the police investigation into Omagh. She came to Omagh, gave her report to the families, gave us an opportunity to question her on that, and, to his credit, Sir Ronnie Flanagan also did that. This man has not even sent an acknowledgement of our letter. I may have a copy of the letter here that we sent to him saying that we would welcome the opportunity to talk about these things and asking him about his terms of reference, but we never even got an acknowledgement. It is obvious this man felt that he had a particular task to do and we were incidental to that task. That is the message, rightly or wrongly, that we are receiving as families.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ20 Chairman:Ì So even at this stage you would welcome the opportunity of sitting down quietly on a confidential basis with Sir Peter?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Absolutely. We would not turn down any opportunity to learn more about what happened at Omagh. I thought that the Prime Minister was unfairly put in that position because he was trying to answer questions on what is a very technical subject and this is a man who has got a country of 60 million people to look after along with all the other worldly things. In the bigger scale of things we recognise this would be well down his priorities. With Sir Peter, whilst we welcomed the opportunity because it showed a degree of sincerity on the Prime Minister's part, I think it would have been very appropriate to have had a meeting with Sir Peter for the families to have an opportunity to talk to him about the issues that were in the report in a similar way that we had done with Nula O'Lone and Sir Ronnie Flanagan.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì Thank you very much for that.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ21 Lady Hermon:Ì Could I just venture one other issue and that is we are bound to have a general election at some stage in the early part of next year at the very latest. Have the families given any serious thought to meeting with David Cameron who may become the next Prime Minister of the country and perhaps would have a different view from that of the present Prime Minister? Has that been considered by the Group?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Lady Hermon, you are absolutely right, and this is the point I made earlier, that when new people come along they feel they are not going to be a victim of the baggage so, therefore, they are willing to open up and allow difficult issues to be dealt with. They can always, of course, say, Well, we weren't in government. We weren't responsible for this or that decision". The answer to your question is yes, we feel it would be very important to talk to David Cameron and, indeed, the Lib Dems. In Northern Ireland we have talked to almost all the political parties and have made them aware of the issues and had a PowerPoint presentation. I think it is appropriate that we talk to David Cameron because we do not know the outcome of a general election but it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that he will be the new Prime Minister and that is certainly something we would welcome, absolutely.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ22 Chairman:Ì May I just ask for clarification. You said you had seen almost all the political parties here.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Yes.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ23 Chairman:Ì Have you not seen Sinn Fein?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý We have not seen Sinn Fein. Probably the reason that we have not seen Sinn Fein is because we have very real difficulties with Sinn Fein. I am a democrat and I accept that Sinn Fein is part of the Government, I have no difficulty with that, but I have difficulty with the fact that people who gained their power through violence and terrorism are now in government, although that is a side issue. Sinn Fein did not support Omagh, unlike in the events of the last fortnight where they did come out wholeheartedly and supported the community to come out and give any information they had about the deaths of the two young soldiers and the police officer, and I welcomed that.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ24 Chairman:Ì In the light of that, would you now welcome a meeting with Mr McGuinness or some of his colleagues?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý I think it is unnecessary because Sinn Fein have already stated publicly that they do support our call for a public inquiry. I have no difficulty going anywhere and sharing a presentation with anyone but they have already stated publicly that they do support our call. Again, I am a democrat and I have no difficulty with any democratic party.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ25 Dr McDonnell:Ì I have very much enjoyed Mr Gallagher's presentation and I thank him and Mr Wilson for all that they have done to represent not just their own families but the extended collective of victims in Omagh. My big worry, and this is not negative, is as you see in a lot of inquiries you may not get the outcome that you feel you deserve. How would you feel in circumstances where you would get an inquiry and maybe it stumbled a bit and you ended up with less than the full and frank disclosure that you anticipated or would have liked to have had?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý If both the British and Irish Governments are open and transparent and co-operate fully with that inquiry I have got to be the democrat I just said I am. I feel I would accept that. I have no preconceived ideas about what the outcome will be. I feel that answers are very important and a large part of what drives me is to try to create change and improve systems that have not worked, and obviously they have not worked when I am sitting here ten and a half years after the event. I do believe there will be a positive outcome from the inquiry. Whether it apportions blame in the way some people perceive_obviously there is a certain amount of deficiency within the system, both north and south, I think everybody accepts that. That point has been made before that it might not have the outcome that we would want and the short answer to that is let us wait and see what an inquiry delivers.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ26 Chairman:Ì I want to bring Mr Murphy in but these are very important things and I would like to go back to the point I made earlier. You said you would welcome the opportunity of sitting down with Sir Peter and talking through his report with him.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Yes.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ27 Chairman:Ì Do I correctly understand from that that if such a meeting could be arranged and if you were indeed persuaded_if_that his inquiries had been totally comprehensive and diligent and accurate that you might then feel there was not a need, bearing in mind the difficulties of bringing things out into the public, to go down this other route?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý That is a very important point. It is important to know that we have been calling for a public inquiry since 2002. We did not learn about the GCHQ information until it was broadcast on 15 September last year. Lady Hermon will be aware of that. Our call for an inquiry is not based on this GCHQ story by John Ware. We have a whole raft of issues which are highlighted in this document. We have called for this inquiry for a long number of years unaware of that intelligence.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ28 Chairman:Ì Yes, I do appreciate that, but my question was based on the Gibson Inquiry. If you met him, and it is not in my gift to arrange such a meeting or in the gift of the Committee, and you were indeed persuaded that all those new issues brought up in the programme had been properly addressed_if_would you then feel perhaps that the need for a public inquiry was not so great?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý The need for a public inquiry is great, but if what transpires from such a meeting is that we are satisfied with GCHQ's handling of the situation then that need not necessarily be part of the inquiry. How could that address all of the other issues? Obviously it could not. What GCHQ has done is just put petrol on the fire, if you like. Our own solicitor signed an affidavit that was read out in court two weeks ago, and you may be aware of this, that states there was a listening device in the car that delivered the bomb to Omagh on 15 August. There was a listening device covertly planted in that car and there was a transcript and recording of what was said in the bomb car and the transmission ended round about the time the bomb detonated. That was what I was talking about earlier. It is a drip feed of very difficult information and facts for the families to deal with. There may be other things that are equally as damaging in the pipeline, and we certainly know there were people involved in the plot to bomb Omagh who were government agents, who were senior members of the Real IRA and who were working for one government agency or another.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ29 Chairman:Ì A final question from me for the moment. If you did not get your wish for a public inquiry, bearing in mind what Dennis Bradley has said, do you think that the Legacy Commission that the consultative group has recommended might be able to deal with some of these other issues which still give you such painful and acute concern?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý I would find it difficult to understand how the Legacy Commission could investigate. We feel that these issues need to be dealt with in a public and transparent way and there needs to be some judicial element to it where people come before a judge and swear on oath as to the statements that they are making. What I take from the Eames-Bradley group is they do recognise that Omagh needs closure. I take the statement that you made earlier about the difficulties in having public inquiries for every death that happened in Northern Ireland, but the Eames-Bradley group have not said that. What they have said is it is too expensive and we should not continue to go down the route of public inquiries, but what they have said about Omagh is we need closure and more or less that it is up to Government to work out a system of getting that closure with the families. As I mentioned earlier, my brother was assassinated in June 1984. I am not asking for a public inquiry into his death. What we have is a catalogue of failings and shortcomings over that ten year period that has to be addressed in a proper and transparent way and the only way that can be done is within a judicial framework. I have dealt with the Eames-Bradley group and, to be honest, I do not think they would have the capability or the skill to deal with the issues that we need to be dealt with in connection with Omagh.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ30 Mr Murphy:Ì Apart from an inquiry, gentlemen, what more do you think the British Government could do to assist the families?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Which inquiry?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ31 Mr Murphy:Ì The public inquiry that you are looking for, or are there other things the Government could do to assist the families?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý It is a very difficult question to answer. We feel that victims of terrorism need to be recognised not as victims of crime but as victims of terrorism. For instance, last week I was at a conference in Madrid and part of what we are doing is looking at how victims of terrorism are treated and we are trying to take that through the European Parliament so that a person, whether they live in France, Italy, Holland or Northern Ireland, is treated equally, they have the same status. As victims of terrorism, to the best of my knowledge, in law we have no status, we are considered under the criminal justice system, not separate from that. I am not talking just about Omagh here but 7/7, Bali and all the other incidents. Victims of terrorism need some status in government and the Government should be looking at that and not lumping us together in the normal criminal justice system.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ32 Mr Murphy:Ì Did you raise that issue with the Prime Minister when you met him?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý It was a very intense meeting.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ33 Mr Murphy:Ì I can imagine.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Although he was very generous with his time, the meeting was very focused and went in a particular direction. When I came out of that meeting there were many things I thought I would have loved to have raised but you cannot raise all of these issues.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝMr Murphy:Ì I feel exactly the same when I leave the Prime Minister's office, believe me!ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ34 Lady Hermon:Ì Could I just pick up on something that you said a little while ago, Mr Gallagher, but it was very significant indeed. Am I right in picking up the reference to your belief that perhaps it is protecting special agents, I think that was the phrase that you used, and that is the main reason why so far you have not been allowed a public inquiry and you suspect that you may not get a public inquiry? Is that at the back of your mind?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý The intelligence services, and I can understand why, will always say that human intelligence assets are key and must be protected at all costs. I met the Home Secretary a number of years ago and said to him the policy we have had in Northern Ireland from the intelligence point of view has been, We cannot do anything about the bomb that has just happened, but let's keep our assets in place and we will try and do something to prevent the next one". That policy has actually left almost 4,000 people in their graves. I said to the Home Secretary, Let's try the reverse of that policy. Let's try and put the people in jail who committed the last atrocity and, therefore, they are not in a position to commit the next atrocity. Let's try that policy and see how it works". I think that the intelligence services are not using the information that they have as vigorously as they could in this country, not in GB, not in the United Kingdom. Let me tell you the reason why. Over the past five years we have seen over 40 terrorists, al-Qaeda and Muslim extreme terrorists, put in jail for planning terrorist acts, for assisting terrorist acts. You know the people I am talking about, the people who tried to attack the transport system and also the people who tried to bring down airliners. That was all fantastic work by the intelligence services, I am glad that happened. Those people were put in jail, they were brought before the courts with proper evidence on a jury trial, no intercept evidence needed, all done properly. Our intelligence services, because it is my intelligence service, can say to the American intelligence services, We don't need to put people in Guantanamo Bay, we can have proper evidence and convict them". That is why I believe in the Omagh incident there are so many discrepancies that we are at a loss as to why these bombers and people associated with them, the service providers, were not put in jail. We had the trial of Sean Hoey and he was facing 58 serious terrorist charges. Let me tell you, you would not like to face one of those serious charges but this man faced 58 terrorist charges. He was acquitted of all terrorist charges at a cost to the taxpayer of #16 million. I am not making any comment either way whether Mr Hoey is innocent or guilty, but when someone is facing 58 serious charges a lot of work went into that, a lot of preparation and planning, and Godfrey and I and others sat through the 56-day trial and it was so disturbing that we contacted Sir Desmond Rea and the Policing Board and asked them to come to Omagh on 17 October. Bear in mind the trial only started in September. We raised our concerns that the trial was of such a shoddy state that the Policing Board should send observers in to monitor it to see for themselves what was happening but they never did that. It was of no surprise to the families when the Hoey trial came up with the verdict that it did. Sorry to be long-winded.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ35 Chairman:Ì No, we note very carefully what you say. We are coming towards the end of our allotted time. We are very grateful to you for what you have said and I do promise you that whatever the Committee finally decides to report, you have been a very impressive and powerful witness and we shall certainly reflect very carefully on what you have said and at least you do have the great advantage of knowing that everything you have said this afternoon will be published because this is a public session. I did promise you at the beginning a brief private session if you would like one. Would you like one or not?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Do you feel there is any value in leaving this document with you? I do not want to burden the Committee.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ36 Chairman:Ì I would like you to have a private word with our clerk about that afterwards. The answer to that may well be yes, although I would hope you have copies of everything, that is very important. Our clerk will talk to you. Are there any points you wish to raise privately?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Godfrey, I have done a lot of talking.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ37 Chairman:Ì If you do I will clear the public gallery if you wish to talk to us privately.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý Are there people in the public gallery?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ38 Chairman:Ì There are people in the public gallery, yes. Not a vast number but there are.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý What we have said we believe is factual and from the heart.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ39 Chairman:Ì Leave it at that.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Gallagher:Ücf1Ý We would be more than happy to supply any more information to any Members of the Committee here or those who are not here.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì That is very kind of you. I speak for every single Member of the Committee who is here when I say that we are grateful to you and Mr Wilson for coming. We appreciate the way in which you have frankly dealt with our questions. There is quite a lot for us to reflect on and deliberate about. We certainly accept your offer that if there are specific points our clerk will come back to you. I want you to know that the Committee would be available to see you again privately, maybe publicly but certainly privately, if you feel you would like to see us. Thank you so much.ËÜjf90ÝÜjf22ÝÜteÜjf199ÝÜnpÜjf165ÝÜjf24ÝNorthern Ireland Affairs CommitteeÌWednesday 25 March 2009ÌÜjf27ÝMembers present:ÌÜjf27ÝSir Patrick Cormack, in the ChairÌÜjf55ÝMr John GroganÈMr Stephen HepburnÈLady HermonÈKate HoeyÌDr Alasdair McDonnellÈMr Denis MurphyÈStephen PoundÈDavid SimpsonÌÜjf22ÝÈÜjf50ÝÜcf2ÝWitnesses: Ücf3ÝMr John WareÜcf1Ý, reporter, Ücf2ÝPanoramaÜcf1Ý and Ücf3ÝMr Leo TellingÜcf1Ý, producer, Ücf2ÝPanoramaÜcf1Ý, gave evidence.ÌÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ40 Chairman:Ì Mr Ware, could I on behalf of the Committee welcome you and your producer, Mr Telling. Thank you for coming, we appreciate your being here. As I explained to you briefly outside, there is to be a major vote in the House of Commons at 4.00, so we will try and conclude our questioning within the hour, and we will obviously want to ask you a lot of things about your film. We just refreshed our memories by seeing it again, and it is clearly a very important and graphic film. Now before we begin, is there anything that you would like to say by way of opening statement?ËÜjf65Ý25 March 2009	Mr John Ware and Mr Leo TellingÌËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I have drafted something which probably runs to three minutes, if you want to hear it.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ41 Chairman:Ì If it is three minutes and no more than three minutes, we would be delighted to hear it. Last week in Belfast I was assured something was going to be three minutes, and it was 10. If yours is three_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I will do my best, and if it feels like it is heading towards four, I will gabble. Sir Peter Gibson in our view provided confirmation of the heart of the programme, which was that GCHQ were monitoring mobiles of some of the bombers. He devoted 16 pages to intercept procedures, and we think that that, combined with some of the statements the Secretary of State has made both to Parliament and the BBC, where he has said in terms that there was intercept evidence, seems to us to amount at least to confirmation. He does not challenge our claim in his published report that the CID were not given the numbers of those mobiles that were being intercepted on the day of the bombing, or indeed any relevant mobiles in the lead-up to the bombing, nor does he challenge what one source told us, that there were four, perhaps five numbers, or that the product of this intercept was available within hours of the bombing. Our own view is that it is what he does not say that is perhaps even more important really. This is a highly circumscribed report, in our view. He does not explain why the CID were not told there had been intercepts. He does not explain why the CID were never given any numbers at any stage. He does not explain why the CID were left for nine months to trawl through phone logs from unclassified files from the telephone companies to make the connections which phones were speaking where and when on the day. Those were connections I am advised which the intelligence services could have made in pretty short order, I cannot say how short, a day, maybe less, because they have access to the names of the registered owners, and the logs as well. In other words, he does not address what in our view is without any question the nub of the programme, which was encapsulated in the title, Ücf2ÝOmagh: What The Police Were Never ToldÜcf1Ý". Indeed, I would say with great respect to Sir Peter he carefully avoids dealing with that central issue. I say that even though an ordinary member of the public reading his report would consider that is precisely what he has done. Paragraph 8,  ...  my terms of reference are not confined to GCHQ and I have investigated  ...  not only what intercept intelligence was shared with Special Branch of the Royal Ulster Constabulary and RUC headquarters but also  ...  what sharing there was by Special Branch and RUC HQ with the police [that is the detectives] investigating the bombing." However, by the time we get to the penultimate paragraph, 31, it seems to me anyway there is a bit of a contradiction here, because Sir Peter says, It was not part of the terms of my review that I should investigate, nor have I investigated, the reasons why Special Branch South acted in the cautious way it did, nor have I investigated the soundness of those reasons, although I do not doubt that Special Branch South took the actions it did for what it considered to be good operational reasons." The distinction in those two paragraphs, 8 and 31, may be lost on the ordinary reader. An ordinary reader could also be forgiven for thinking that but for Special Branch caution, whatever that means, and he does not explain it, the CID could have had any telephone number, any transcript, any tape recording, in fact anything they wanted from GCHQ but for the asking by their interlocutors, the Special Branch. But I do not think that is the case. I am expressing a personal view here, but it is because I have been involved in this subject for quite a long time. I hold no brief for the police, Special Branch or anybody else, I work for the BBC, I am an independent journalist, but I personally think it would be a travesty of history to record that the failings of this inquiry were ultimately principally at the door of the detectives. I think myself that the answer to why these numbers were not shared with the detectives has more to do with the protocols that existed within the intelligence services at the time. My guess is I am probably at three minutes and I have only got halfway through, so the rest will have to come in supplementaries.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ42 Chairman:Ì Thank you very much for that beginning. In your film, which, as I have said, we have seen again this afternoon, there are reconstructions as you imagine things to have been but there are certain things stated, as it were, as absolute fact. How do you know that the things that you state as fact in your film actually happened?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý There are things that we attribute to a source, and there are certain questions that we ask. If you want to pinpoint what particular passage in the script you are referring to, then I am able to help, but the programme was actually pretty carefully caveated. Certainly the section to do with whether the bombing could have been prevented, something we did not assert, is heavily caveated.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ43 Chairman:Ì But you do state that certain transmissions were made from certain phones or certain vehicles at certain specific times, and you are very exact about that. I am not saying that you are wrong, but I want to know how you are so sure.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I think with respect to the times, they form part of an exhibit which the police have drawn up and refined over the years, drawn from the cell site analysis that the RUC and the PSNI refined, about what number was phoning and to which base station mast it was linked at the time of that communication episode. So that is one point. So far as, for example, extracts of what was said or words to that effect, like bricks in the wall", or crossing the line", those have come from more than one source. I am not going to get into sources, but they are sources that I am satisfied were in a position to know what they were talking about.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ44 Chairman:Ì But you state them in the film as fact. As you know, and as I know, there is fact and there is fiction, and there is what people sometimes call faction.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I have not read the script for some time. I wonder if you could point me to a passage.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ45 Chairman:Ì I do not have a copy of your script.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I have one here, I am sure you do not want to read it now, but anyway, I like to think I am pretty careful about attributing something which is potentially very controversial to a source without obviously naming the source. I am not sure there is anywhere_ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ46 Chairman:Ì Would you please leave a copy of your script?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I will have to send you one because this has a lot of sourcing in the left-hand column which I would not wish you to see, but I can certainly send you one.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ47 Chairman:Ì With great respect, we can ask to see persons and papers, and we would like to see your annotated script.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I am going to have to take legal advice on that obviously. Come on, Sir Patrick, that is pushing it a bit. We normally do not reveal our sources. You must have talked to lots of journalists in your career and you would never have wished them to reveal their sources. I think you will find a pretty robust response from the BBC if you go down that line.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì Perhaps you could talk to our clerk about that.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝMr Grogan:Ì Sir Patrick, I do not think we would all support seeing that.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ48 Chairman:Ì But we would like to see a copy of your script.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý You can have one.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝMr Grogan:Ì Not the annotated script. Are we clear, Sir Patrick?ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì We are asking for a copy of the script.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝMr Grogan:Ì But not the sources.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ49 Chairman:Ì I am not asking for sources.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý My colleague tells me he has brought one. Here you are.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ50 Chairman:Ì Thank you very much indeed. You can leave that with us.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý It is unannotated.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ51 Chairman:Ì You will, of course, appreciate that there may well be things, having read that, that we wish to follow up on, because with great respect to my colleague, we are conducting an inquiry into this. We may well ask you for some supplementary information.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I will do whatever I can, of course.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì That is something that is very important. Can I bring in Lady Hermon?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ52 Lady Hermon:Ì Thank you, Sir Patrick. Mr Ware, could I just cover three separate areas to begin with, I know that other colleagues want to join in the questioning subsequently. So the first area I would particularly like you to cover is what exactly has been the fall-out, if I can call it that, between the BBC and the government, following the broadcast of your programme last year? Have there been exchanges of correspondence between the Director General of the BBC and certain government ministers? Have there been arguments?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý There have been some communications between, I think, the Cabinet Secretary and the Director General.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ53 Lady Hermon:Ì Were you involved in that sort of correspondence?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý No, but I am aware of what took place.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ54 Lady Hermon:Ì Has it been difficult for you within the BBC since the broadcast?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Quite the reverse.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ55 Lady Hermon:Ì Could you elaborate on that? Journalists have been supportive?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Well, it is not just journalists. The editorial chain from the top down has been extremely supportive, because I have confided in them a great deal of the basis of this programme, and they have been very solid and supportive, they think it is an important programme, and obviously our response, which you have probably read, to Sir Peter has been through our legal department, has been through the editorial chain of command, and has the imprimatur of the BBC on it, not just me.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ56 Lady Hermon:Ì Would you like to add anything?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Telling:Ücf1Ý No, I think that is absolutely right. There has been no suggestion from anyone at the BBC that we should not have broadcast the programme exactly as it was.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ57 Lady Hermon:Ì Thank you.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I gather the Cabinet Secretary did say to the Director General the day before transmission, Just a courtesy call, do not worry, this is not a Hutton", which was very gracious of him, but we do not see it remotely in the same category as Hutton. In fact, I would say the reverse is the case.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ58 Lady Hermon:Ì Thank you. The second area, and of course it is key to your programme, and key to Sir Peter's report as well, though not in any particular detail in the edited version, but it has been published, when you were just making your opening statement to the Committee, you mentioned at the very end and then stopped, you obviously have some understanding of why the telephone numbers known to GCHQ were not divulged to the CID. Why do you think they were not divulged to CID?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I think we get a clue in Sir Peter's report, and the paragraph precisely escapes me, but from memory, I think it is 23, let me just double check that.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ59 Lady Hermon:Ì Yes, please do.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Yes, there it is, 23. Sir Peter seems to me to be saying there that there was a very strict regime in place governing the dissemination of intelligence. In fact, so strict that it was not always possible to share the fact that an interception had taken place even with some sections of the Special Branch, never mind the detective officers, the ordinary CID. I say ordinary, they are not ordinary, I mean the CID. If you read the paragraph carefully, you will see there I think an interpretation of the 1994 Act and subsequently, which I think had been sort of echoed in the Interception of Communications Act 1985 and the one that reformed that, RIPA, which essentially says that nothing shall be disclosed to anybody if there is the remotest risk of getting into the evidential chain. So, therefore, not only were telephones not given to the CID, but the fact of interception was never disclosed to them. I summarise it as a doctrine of total secrecy, and no doubt there was a good reason for it at some stage, and there probably is a very good reason for it in lots of cases, but in this particular case, I would have thought that the demands of the criminal justice system I think would have been helped if there had been some relaxation of that doctrine, and I am expressing a personal view here, but as indeed the Chief Constable has suggested has taken place. He has referred to a different regime being in place, he mentions this, I think, in his letter to the Secretary of State, when Sir Peter Gibson's report was published, but I think therein lies the reason for why the detectives were not given, so to speak, the bullets to fire in the first place. I am aware of the criticisms of the CID, and I am sure a lot of them are justified. I note that Sir Peter refers to the Special Branch's caution, but the fact of the matter is, you have to ask yourself, why were the Special Branch so cautious, and maybe it was because they knew that if they went back to GCHQ and said, Can we tell the detectives"_I am not saying they did this, I do not know that they did this, but, Can we tell the detectives that there were intercepts, can we give them some numbers?", because boy this would be a head start, you have got some numbers there that were engaged to a greater or lesser degree in this operation. A number, unless it is one of these Pay As You Go phones_and almost all of the phones engaged in the Omagh bombing, there were 22 phones, I think, identified by the cell site analysis in respect of five linked incidents, were registered. The owners of those telephones and their addresses would have been available to the police within a very short time. There is no doubt about that. They have access, rightly so, to billing, and they could have got that from the Irish side, I am sure, with an event of this kind. Sir Patrick, if I have a number and it registers to Sir Patrick Cormack and it looks as if that phone has been in some way engaged in this operation and I am a police officer, I am going to knock on your door and if you cannot explain to me where your phone is or who you have lent it to, you are going to come with me to the cells until you do, hopefully. That could have happened. Do not take my word for it, ask some of the detectives who have been on this inquiry. That never happened. Sir Peter Gibson does not address that central question as to why that did not happen. All he does is cite the regime, without expressing a view as to whether it was the right regime for this particular act of mass murder, or not. He simply reports the doctrine that applied at the time.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ60 Chairman:Ì You are, of course, referring quite appropriately and properly to the version of Sir Peter's report, the published version.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I am, that is true.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ61 Chairman:Ì Of course you are. You have not seen_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý No, I have not.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ62 Chairman:Ì Now Sir Hugh Orde, who obviously has seen the full version, seems entirely reassured by Sir Peter's report.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý In what respect?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ63 Chairman:Ì Well, he has gone on record, and we have it here, as saying that he does not believe that anything could have been done to prevent the bombing, and that there was no_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý He has, I noticed that, but Sir Patrick, he has said that, I do not know how hard he has been grilled on that.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ64 Chairman:Ì I think that is casting aspersions on a highly respected_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý No, I am not, I am simply drawing a distinction_I am not. But what I am doing is I think you can also find, I cannot remember where the reference is, that Sir Hugh has said that he has no dispute with the conclusions of the Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland, the former Ombudsman, Nuala O'Loan in December 2001. I cannot turn up the reference, but in effect she said had all the intelligence been available and assessed properly over that weekend, there could have been further evidential opportunities. What she is saying there is they could have hit some doors, instead of mucking about with the five arrests that they did make, which had no relevance at all to the incident, these were just names of suspects in the Omagh area. I am quite satisfied that the people who reviewed all that material were quite satisfied themselves that opportunities were there for the taking very quickly. So Sir Hugh would need to say why on the one hand he does not think anything could have been done but at the same time he agrees with the Police Ombudsman, because part of their evidence did include access to the intercept material.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì Yes, we will have a chance to ask Sir Hugh on a future occasion about these things.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ65 Mr Murphy:Ì But irrespective of the amount of material that was available to GCHQ, it would only be of any use at all if it was passed on, and even if it was passed on to, I presume then it would have been Special Branch South, which was in Portadown, they were not allowed to share that information with their colleagues in the North unless they sought permission from GCHQ, and then and only then, according to Sir Peter's report, could they pass on a sanitised version of that.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý That is right.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ66 Mr Murphy:Ì Which GCHQ were happy with.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý That was not the law, those were their protocols at the time.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ67 Mr Murphy:Ì I am merely posing the question, that it would be almost impossible, irrespective of the information that was held at GCHQ, unless the rules were relaxed, to know that information.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I accept that, but the rules have subsequently been_I do not know about relaxed, but changed, reformed, and that seems to be to me to be a recognition that the protocols in place at the time were not fit at least for the purpose of bringing to justice people involved in mass murder.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ68 Mr Murphy:Ì Sir Peter almost says that in his report.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Why does he not say it? He spends a lot of time talking about Ücf2ÝPanoramaÜcf1Ý. Why does he not say this? That is the question, with respect, you need to ask him.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ69 Mr Murphy:Ì He does concede that what was in place with GCHQ would actually prevent that information being passed on, so whilst he does not condemn that_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý He is not actually saying that, with respect. He is saying the Special Branch were cautious, they could have gone back to ask them, they never did. Well maybe the reason they never did was because they knew there was not a hope in hell of them getting an affirmative answer, but I do not know.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ70 Mr Murphy:Ì That is exactly what I read into that.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý But the point is that Sir Peter, with the greatest respect to him, leaves all this terribly opaque. He is happy to editorialise in respect of Ücf2ÝPanoramaÜcf1Ý about a subsidiary issue_ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ71 Mr Murphy:Ì I am not defending him.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I know you are not, but you have given me the opportunity to make the point. He is happy to editorialise about the extent to which we have raised in my view a totally legitimate question about whether the bombing could have been stopped once we were satisfied, as we are and as we remain today, that there were intercepts, but he says absolutely nothing about the wisdom of those protocols, and the question is why.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ72 Chairman:Ì Well, the Committee may well have the chance to ask Sir Peter that.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I hope you do.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ73 Chairman:Ì There are two essential issues here which are troubling the families of Omagh, and we saw them again last week. The first question is: could that bombing conceivably have been anticipated and therefore stopped? You are not saying that it could have been, you are raising those questions. The other question, of course, is why has it taken so long not to bring the right people to account, and you very properly included a clip of Sir Ronnie Flanagan saying that no stone would be left unturned. Well, however many stones have been turned or unturned, nobody has yet been convicted of this most appalling atrocity, and what we are seeking to do, in our brief inquiry, we met the Omagh victims, is to pursue these two issues to see whether we believe (a) that something could have been done to stop it, but (b) whether more could have been done to bring to justice the perpetrators.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Yes, I follow.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ74 Chairman:Ì Those are our essential tasks and we are focusing on those tasks. Insofar as you can help us with them we are very grateful.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I cannot help you as to whether the bombing could have been stopped. I have no reason_Sir Peter is pretty clear it could not have been stopped. He has had access_ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ75 Chairman:Ì And you do not challenge that?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý How can I challenge that? There are a lot of questions I want to ask about that, because I think again there are some, on the face of it, which may_ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ76 Chairman:Ì I am sorry to pin you down, but it is very important that we do if we are going to conduct this inquiry. You are not in fact challenging, as I infer from what you say_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý It is a qualified unchallenge. OK? It's an unqualified challenge.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì Alright. Thank you for that, that is reasonably clear. I will bring in Mr Simpson, then Dr McDonnell, and then back to Lady Hermon.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ77 David Simpson:Ì We just do not have the time, John, to go into all the detail and all the questions that we would like to ask, and I think the programme did reveal a lot and a lot of concerns, and I think it raised a lot of issues, but in relation to one point, do you accept Sir Peter Gibson's dismissal of your assertion that the Gards in the South had warned the Northern Ireland counterparts of a likely attack?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Mr Simpson, I do not entirely, and I can explain why. This is terribly frustrating because I cannot disclose my sources, but this source is a very reliable individual. This source was, so this source tells me, with the individual from the Special Branch who was made aware on the 14th that the Garda S–«ocha«na were concerned there may be something on the move. Now I have not seen a record of this warning, if one was given. I think there were at that time a number of warnings, the whole border was pretty jittery, as you will recall these dreadful bombings coming up through the Dundalk/Newry corridor, so everybody was very jittery, and how formalised, how confident this particular warning was, I simply cannot say, but I know what I was told, and I have been back to this source on a number of occasions. And I would just say this, that it is consistent with other things that I know about that were what I believe to have been known to the Gards at the time, and I want to make it absolutely clear, in no way am I buying into this business about Detective Garda John White, with which I am sure you will all be familiar. Nothing that has ever been said to me about the Garda S–«ocha«na Crime and Intelligence Branch allowing a bomb to go through has ever_I think there are major problems with Detective Garda White's credibility in all sorts of ways, I just want to make that clear. None of this relates to that. However, in the course of my interview with Sir Peter, I did suggest a number of people that he might want to go and interview, one of whom I knew to my certain knowledge he had not interviewed, because in fact I had had a conversation with this individual, as it happened, a few days earlier. My understanding is he then did go and interview this individual, but according to this individual's account of his interview with Sir Peter to me, he did not ask him about 14 August. So for Sir Peter to say there is no evidence whatever before me" is not strictly true.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ78 Mr Hepburn:Ì Then why did he not offer that information? Surely it was a crucial point. Why did the individual you are talking about, if he was being interviewed by Sir Peter, not offer that information?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I cannot answer that.ËÜfcÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ79 Mr Hepburn:Ì Do you not think it is strange, when you are saying_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I suppose on the face of it, it is a bit strange, but I do not know what_ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ80 Mr Hepburn:Ì Is he not saying one thing to one person and something different to another?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I cannot help you. I mean, you may be sceptical, that is fair enough, but I know this individual_ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ81 Chairman:Ì Mr Ware, we are trying just to get some helpful information. I respect you as a journalist, who is not a sensational journalist, but who tries to do a thorough and proper professional job. I also respect Sir Peter as a man of integrity. Now you saw Sir Peter and you had an interview with him. I am not asking you in public session to say exactly what you said to Sir Peter, of course I am not, but when you were talking to Sir Peter, did you in fact share with him some of your sources, so that he could talk to them?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I did not share with Sir Peter any of my sources, but I have to say I do not think the way he conducted the interview with me was a very efficient way of dealing with the questions that he had, that is my personal view, because he gave me no forewarning that he was going into some depth about matters, some of which were pretty complicated, to do with algorithms and technical data about interception, and all of that. If I had been aware of that, I would of course have brought all my files with me and I was really at a bit of a loss_ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ82 Chairman:Ì Did you not have the chance then to go back to the files and see him again?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Well I did and I wrote, but he would not let me have a note of the questions, would not let me take anyone with me, would not let me have a note of his questions. The Private Secretary was taking notes, and I said, Some of the things I cannot remember; if you give me a note of the questions, I will take them back and I will help you". No, he would not have it. I thought personally his approach was defective, to be perfectly frank. It is not the way I would have conducted research. His approach was adversarial, he was impatient. I am not the only person to express that view about the way he approached this matter. He may well, probably had, seen vast amounts of classified material that I never had. He may have had an absolutely well settled view about where the truth of these things lay, which I accept would entitle him to be a little brusque and dismissive, but he certainly was both of those, I can tell you.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ83 Chairman:Ì You saw him once?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I saw him for two and a half hours.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ84 Chairman:Ì But on one occasion, you did not go back?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý On one occasion, and I then went back_I was busy engaged on another programme, but I thought it was a very unsatisfactory way of having conducted an interview. It is not the adversarial element I mind, it is just that when you are trying to explain something, or as I often did, I said, If you tell me what lies behind that question, I can help". I am not here to answer your questions, Mr Ware". Well, okay. And I think to be perfectly frank, some of what he said, if I may say so, in his report, was_I am trying to think of another word for disingenuous, I cannot instantly think of one, it will do for the moment, but he said in his report, if you remember, he drew a conclusion about bricks in the wall", he said he was satisfied there was no such phrase issued in respect of Banbridge and therefore no benchmark, as it were, for those listening to have been alerted to the fact, if they had been listening live. That may be academic now, if we do accept the bombing could not have been stopped, but the point is, what he did not say, what I did not know then, because this was one error we made based on a source that made it in good faith, went back to the source, got it corrected, it was in fact Lisburn. I think it would have been helpful in his report to have said not Banbridge, but actually those words were used at an incident even before Banbridge, which is worse, if you think about it. But he does not say that. Why does he not say that?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ85 Chairman:Ì Just a minute, you are being a bit adversarial, in fact you are quite good at it. So I should think you and Sir Peter would make a wonderful pair together.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I tell you, if I did that in the BBC, I would be up before our editorial complaints unit, and rightly so.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ86 Chairman:Ì Now look, let me just pin you down on this, because your very influential programme, an extremely well-made programme, if I may say, a very compelling programme, about the worst incident in over 30 years of Troubles, obviously caused not only interest but distress, not just in the province but throughout the United Kingdom, and beyond, in the Republic too. Now you do actually say in your programme very specifically this phrase bricks in the wall". You categorically said it was Banbridge and then it was Omagh. Sir Peter does refute this_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý He does not refute the words were used at Omagh, I do not think he refutes the words were used at Omagh, or words to that effect.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ87 Chairman:Ì I am just concerned as to your getting into too much of a spat with Sir Peter, and therefore obscuring the real facts. You are absolutely convinced from information you got that this was in effect a code phrase that was used to herald a previous bombing and that was used at Omagh?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý That is what I am told, and I have been back to this source on a number of occasions. I believe this source, the source is a person of integrity, and in a position to know. I can do no more than that.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ88 Chairman:Ì And the source is not the person to whom you referred when my colleague Mr Hepburn challenged you a few minutes ago, is not the person to whom Sir Peter did not ask what were in your view the right questions?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I am not going to get into that. That might identify him, and to that extent I have some sympathy with the intelligence services, because questions of that sort can lead to identification, so I cannot go there. Neither confirm nor deny.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì Fair enough. We may perhaps on a future occasion ask for a private meeting with you, but fair enough, this is on the record, so we take that for the time being certainly. Dr McDonnell?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ89 Dr McDonnell:Ì Thank you very much, Chairman. Thank you very much, Mr Ware. As someone perhaps not as well attuned to these things, but can you explain to me what the purpose of monitoring was if it was not to be acted on and to intercept bombs? What did they intend doing with this stuff?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Can I say that is an extremely perceptive question, I genuinely mean that. Again, Chairman, I take your comments, I do not want to get into a spat with Sir Peter, you are absolutely right, let us stick to the more important issue.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ90 Dr McDonnell:Ì What I am really getting at_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý You are right, he says, does he not, that the SB never highlighted any particular number as being one to watch out for in respect of a potential bombing, Omagh or anywhere else. He says something pretty much like that. Now bearing in mind that the Special Branch's purpose in those days certainly was to prevent first and foremost a bang, that was their principal job, obviously to assist the detectives wherever they could, but first and foremost, they were there to forewarn and wherever possible provide information so the security forces could interdict or disrupt, that was the way they saw their task, and you will see that in Sir Dan Crompton's report. He emphasises that that is the way. I am sorry to bring Sir Peter back into it, but given that he does not deny numbers were given, he just disputes the priority that they were given, it is, I quite agree with you, hard to understand for what purpose other than the fact that when these numbers were busy might the Special Branch have given them to GCHQ in the first place. Presumably not so they can listen to their County Louth accents or anything of that sort. I am not being facetious, it was for a purpose.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ91 Dr McDonnell:Ì Or to provide bedtime reading.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Quite. If you get any of them in front of you, you may want to ask them. But I can tell you this for an absolute fact, and I am not going to get into sources again, but I sat down with an individual who claims to have made that request to GCHQ, and if I went back to this individual once, I went back to this individual on a number of occasions, and said: what do you mean when you say you expected to be given a heads-up on this? What do you mean?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ92 Chairman:Ì Mr Ware, I may be wrong, I just want to clarify something for all our sakes. My understanding after the tragic business of Dr David Kelly was that the BBC did say that journalists should always check a source against another source. In other words, have two sources to make sure that they were not inadvertently putting forward something that was not necessarily the case. Did you check your sources against sources?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý That is not a precise reading. I played some part in the development of those protocols, as it happened, because you may not know this, but I made a programme about the BBC and the Gilligan episode and was highly critical -- unusually and unfashionably, I happen to agree with Lord Hutton's comments, and I said this Balkanised independent BBC said that the Director General had bet the farm on a shaky foundation, so believe me, I am not trying to suggest I am the oracle on sources, but I know how important they are. You are quite right, wherever possible. However, if the Cabinet Secretary tells you something, not that he ever does, but if he did_ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ93 Chairman:Ì We would be so lucky.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý _you would be entitled to say, well, you know, he is in a position to know.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ94 Stephen Pound:Ì I would certainly want it to be double sourced.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Okay, bad example, but you take the point. There are circumstances in which sources, if you are satisfied they are in a position to know something, you can rely on them. It is always better to have them double sourced, and in some cases, and I must say, in many respects, much of this was not only double but triple sourced actually, but there were one or two bits of it which were single sourced, but they were only in cases when I was satisfied the person was in a position to know.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ95 Chairman: Ücf1ÝBricks in the wall" was single sourced or double sourced?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Negative. It was more than one source, believe me.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ96 Dr McDonnell:Ì Is it your hypothesis that some of the hypersensitivity was related to cross-border monitoring?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I do not know.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ97 Dr McDonnell:Ì I am still trying to get my own head round why GCHQ should be doing all this monitoring and not doing anything with it.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý To be fair, GCHQ are worker bees. They are set tasks, as I understand it, and they are a service provider. They are not there to analyse this and that and the other, they provide the coverage. My understanding is, and this is very well sourced, that as the dissident campaign developed, the Special Branch got extra funding for interception of a very significant number of telephone boxes, in fact most boxes, I think, in the area where most of the bombings were happening. Special Branch's intercept ability stops at the border, they are not allowed to operate south of the border. Obviously GCHQ does have that capability. There came a point where Special Branch got a lead on one or more numbers, and they gave it to GCHQ, you know, if I am calling you and you are calling someone else, they can do all that stuff much more quickly than the ordinary SB system. So you develop a matrix about who is talking to whom. And that was the assistance, as I understand it, that GCHQ were providing. But as you rightly say, what on earth would the point have been of Special Branch asking for this service if it was not to do what the branch did principally, which was to prevent, disrupt and interdict? The inference I draw from Sir Peter, and it may well be right, really, is these guys simply did not prioritise it enough. They said, Keep an eye on those numbers", but they did not say, Look, we really do think that this one is worse than that", or something, I do not know.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ98 Dr McDonnell:Ì Has your evidence strengthened since the programme? Have you reinforced any of the evidence along those lines around this?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I have heard nothing, quite the reverse actually, quite the reverse. Because when you get a report like this, that sort of basically says you have got it all wrong, or much of it, you think, blimey, have I? It is quite shattering. So of course I went back to some sources, and nothing has changed, nothing, nothing at all.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ99 Lady Hermon:Ì There are two areas that I am particularly interested in, and completely baffled about. I am deeply distressed, very deeply distressed that the detectives spent, according to your programme, some nine months trawling through telephone records. GCHQ had monitored at least five mobile telephones. Am I right in thinking that in fact the information, certainly the number of one of those telephones had also been connected with a previous bombing in Banbridge, is that correct?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý My information is that the Colm Murphy mobile_well, it is not just my information, it is a matter of public record now_if we can refer to it as the 585 Murphy mobile, played a co-ordinating role in the Banbridge bombing precisely two weeks before. My understanding is that cell site analysis had been done which identified that telephone as having been involved. I do not know that that telephone number was given to GCHQ to monitor, I do not know that. I do firmly believe, in fact I know, that a telephone call from a telephone box which was being monitored, and where they went through a series of dry run warnings, did connect with the Murphy mobile, and that alone_hindsight is a wonderful thing. We are getting into maybe too much detail here, but the devil really is in the detail of all this. The answer is I do not know whether GCHQ were monitoring that phone. I believe they probably were, but I do not know. They should have been, but I do not know, and it depends whether they were given the number by the Branch in the first place.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ100 Lady Hermon:Ì Do you actually believe that the information about the telephones was withheld from detectives in order to protect sources?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Do I believe it, or do I know it?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ101 Lady Hermon:Ì Both questions. Do you believe it, do you know it? Do you know it?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I do not know it.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ102 Lady Hermon:Ì But you believe it?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I do not believe anything unless I have proof.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ103 Chairman:Ì Well, you did not have absolute proof of many things that you said in the film, and you said them in totally good faith, I accept that.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I do not believe it unless I have had a silent click in my head. I have not had a silent click in my head on that.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ104 Chairman:Ì So you cannot give an affirmative to either_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý No, I cannot. And as a matter of fact, I have totally avoided speculating on that, because you could make a circumstantial case that that may have been the case, but it may also not have been the case, and I do not know the answer to it.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ105 Lady Hermon:Ì Have you also been told that the car that was involved in the horrendous dreadful bombing in Omagh was bugged, do you have that information?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I have no information as to that. There were suspicions that may have been the case, but I have no information to that effect. In fact, there was a sweep of the debris, I think the second time around, to double check whether that was the case, and nothing was found.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ106 Lady Hermon:Ì Nothing was found?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Nothing was found. That does not mean to say if it was, it was destroyed in the explosion_I just do not know. That arose from the essential one-sided nature of the conversation. But if I can just finish, Sir Patrick, because Lady Hermon asked an important question about the Murphy phone, as I say I do not know for a fact that the Murphy phone was one of the phones being listened to, but I strongly suspect that it was. The reason I strongly suspect that it was is because the words crossing the line" are as I understand it uttered consistent with the time that the phone logs say the convoy was crossing the border, and those two cars, without any question, contained the Murphy phone and another telephone, the bomb car phone and the scout car phone.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ107 Kate Hoey:Ì Behind all of this, of course, there are the many grieving families that we have met and you have obviously met. Did it upset you that Sir Peter and Shaun Woodward almost implied that you had been leading the families on, and this whole thing had led them to feel_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I will be frank with you, I thought it was not only unworthy, I thought it was totally unwarranted. What especially upset me was the fact that I went to considerable lengths_I know the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, I used to make programmes with him. I sent him a private e-mail to say, It is being suggested that we may have, what do you call it, raised expectations, Shaun, nothing could be further from the truth". Not only did I travel over to Northern Ireland, with Leo, and spent an afternoon having gathered as many of the families as we could, about 30 altogether, relatives, and told them the limits of my knowledge_I do not have the transcript, we can produce one if you want, but I am quite satisfied that it would show you that caveat after caveat after caveat was contained in everything I said to them about whether it could have been stopped or not. I made that clear to Sir Peter Gibson. I also made it clear to him that we had written, unusually for us, to all of the branches of the government that normally handle inquiries about these matters, not to just the PSNI, but the Home Office as well, eight weeks before transmission, not exactly sending them a script, but pretty much setting out what we were minded to say, the bits that we were not too sure about, the bits we were sure about, and invited them to comment. Not in a mischievous way, in a totally off the record unattributable way, in the way that briefing often goes on. And I made it absolutely clear in those letters that I did not want to_the one danger I was concerned about was that this was going to result in a whole lot of headlines that said, They could have been saved", when actually that was not the case.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ108 Chairman:Ì Did you show them the programme?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý No, of course not. We do not show programmes in advance, they did not need to see the programme in advance, I would submit, because the e-mails and letters I sent made it absolutely clear where we were going. They said, We are not getting involved in all this". The question I would respectfully suggest you might wish to ask members of government if they come is: why, if they have said what they have now said about the bombing, and what could not have been stopped, could they not have briefed us then? We work for the BBC, we are responsible journalists. I do not want to lead people up the garden path, but in any event it is quite clear that the relatives do not feel that, and they have made that clear, and Sir Peter has ignored all of that.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ109 Mr Hepburn:Ì What about the headline, The words that could have saved Omagh"?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I do not write headlines.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ110 Kate Hoey:Ì He did not write the headline.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý You are referring to the Telegraph. I did not write the headline.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ111 Kate Hoey:Ì I think you wrote and asked for a rebuttal, you have not received anything from government on that, they have not withdrawn the suggestions?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý No.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ112 Kate Hoey:Ì Just one final point. In sitting where you are and in sitting where we are, we equally sometimes feel as left out of knowing what is going on, and various things.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Do you? That is dreadful. You are only Parliamentarians.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ113 Kate Hoey:Ì What do you think we should be doing now, because clearly Sir Peter has produced a report which knowing even what we know, in my view, is not a report that I think should close the door. I do not think it has answered the very serious allegations that were made by your programme. What do you think should happen now?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Well, if we just take it from the point of view of the families, I cannot speak for them, any more than I am speaking for anybody, but I think the thing that has eaten away at them actually is a lack of openness actually. They are immensely touched that the Prime Minister met them and took an hour of his time to meet them, and brought all those very senior people over, and I think they were genuinely touched by that really, because the Prime Minister is someone who genuinely feels this kind of pain for people like them, I think that really mattered to them. I personally think, the question I would like to know, because I still do not know the answer, is whether I am right when I say that it was the doctrine and the protocols that applied at the time which prevented as I say the bullets being given to the detectives. I would like to see whether an official or a minister would acknowledge that, and I think myself that if one or other did do that, I think that would actually go a long way, because it would be a kind of act of contrition to the families. It would not solve everything, but it would be an acknowledgment that the culture and the processes at the time were not fit for that purpose, investigating the worst atrocity of the Irish Troubles, and I think that would really help.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì We are moving towards the end. Mr Pound?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ114 Stephen Pound:Ì An act of contrition is entirely appropriate at this time of year, but can I just ask you a question about the technology? One of the key issues to me is whether there was live monitoring, and whether there was locational and directional analysis that could certainly have been intensely helpful. We are told on the one hand that such technology did not exist in 1998, and we are told on the other hand that it did. You had an expert on your programme saying that he felt that the technology did. We have been told through the prism of Gibson that it did not. You are a professional in this medium. Can I ask your personal opinion of whether you feel that technology was in existence at the time?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý I am going to rely on Sir Peter for this, because actually again buried away is an interesting admission, I think. He refers to the fact that you can get near live monitoring of conversations, and I think what that means is, as I understand the system, if he gives evidence before you he will no doubt correct this, but I think the way it works is once a telephone has been involved in a bombing, it is plugged into the system and if it is priority 1, 2 or 3, depending on how serious it is, different lights light up. The system is then interrogated, headlines are dashed off and whizzed off by fax or whatever to the customer, Special Branch. So there was that capability. As to positioning or not, this is what Sir Peter says, and I think the paragraph is 31, and he says this: Information on the location of a mobile telephone only existed within the mobile phone network in respect of `communications events'_when a phone was switched on or off, or during a call, for instance_and even then would have been limited to information about the cell (the area covered by a particular mast) in which the phone was active." So that seems to me to be acknowledging that there was the facility to give broad locational information. Now how broad depends on topography, depends on whether the system was digital or analogue, as I understand it, but there is an admission from the oracle, so to speak, that that ability was there.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ115 Chairman:Ì But you have to read the next sentence also, do you not, It is clear therefore that no intelligence or security agency or law enforcement agency did see or could have seen what was suggested by the Ücf2ÝPanoramaÜcf1Ý programme in its representation."ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Sorry, with respect to Sir Patrick, Mr Pound was asking me about the technology, not what actually happened on the day, I think.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ116 Stephen Pound:Ì Can I just say, I am sorry, I do not want to deconstruct this, but the words that Sir Peter said described a phone that was either on or off or in use. I cannot think of any other status that a telephone could have, other than being on, off or in use. What is your interpretation of that? It could be smashed, I suppose.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý If you are on a bombing run, why would you turn it off? The whole point of having a scout car is to check that there are not any VCPs or security forces ahead, so you would not turn it off, would you?ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ117 Stephen Pound:Ì How can a phone be other than on, off or in use? Surely those are the only_ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý There is this make to break_Leo is more expert on this than me.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Telling:Ücf1Ý From our conversations with Greg Smith, who was our expert, this is all from unclassified sources, the phone will check into the mast periodically to say, Hello, here I am, which is my nearest mast, have I still got a signal", and you can look at your phone anywhere you like and you see the strength of the signal and which network you are connected to. Now the phone has to check into the base station, the mast, periodically to make sure it is still connected to a network, and it does that quite regularly, and every time it does that, that information is logged within the mobile phone system. So it is possible to actually track the phone while it is on.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝDr McDonnell:Ì But the other point about on, off or in use is sometimes it is on but not functioning because there is no mast to connect with.ËÜjf12ÝÜcf3ÝChairman:Ì Mr Grogan, a very quick question.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ118 Mr Grogan:Ì Just one quick question. It seems to me that reading the published version of Sir Peter's report, there is only one point when he challenges the central thrust of your programme, when he says that there was an all source intelligence picture briefing on 20 August from Special Branch South to the CID investigation team. Would you comment on that? Do you believe that that ever took place?ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Yes, a briefing of some sort did take place. He may have talked to the same people I have spoken to, he has certainly not spoken to some of the people I have spoken to, because I have asked them, but my understanding, based not just on recollection, let me put it like that, is that a briefing did take place on 20 August. I am not suggesting other briefings did not take place, but the one that seems to matter was the senior investigating officer, Detective Chief Superintendent Houston was briefed by the SB responsible for the Omagh area, north region, and Houston then briefed Anderson, and there is a reliable account of what that briefing involved, and it did not involve any of the names that subsequently were tipped up to the detectives.ËÜjf13ÝÜcf3ÝQ119 Chairman:Ì The division bell is ringing and I am obliged by the practice of the House to bring this session to a close, but can I thank you and Mr Telling for coming. It is very possible that we will wish to follow up on some of these things, possibly with another session, maybe with a session with you in private, but thank you for coming, and we shall look forward to our further sessions on this with other witnesses too.ËÜjf14ÝÜcf4ÝMr Ware:Ücf1Ý Thank you.ËÜjf90ÝÜjf22ÝÜte