22 February 2002
Officials were worried that a judicial review of the decision by Rural Affairs Secretary Margaret Beckett to hold a secret inquiry into Whitehall's handling of the crisis could set a damaging legal precedent. The memo, from chief medical officer Liam Donaldson, revealed the extent of anxiety over the case, which opened at the High Court this week.
'There is some pressure from the Cabinet Office not to challenge the judicial review so that an adverse judgment on holding inquiries in private is not registered,' he wrote.
Officials from the former Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food fear they will be made scapegoats by a public inquiry. 'We will be the fall guys, as we were for BSE. There was not enough attention paid to the role of the Cabinet Office and Downing Street during that inquiry,' said one former Maff official.
The government's opponents at the High Court are claiming that the private Whitehall inquiry lacks independence because the secretariat is drawn heavily from Cabinet Office staff.
PFfeb2002
