On January 28, Lord Hutton finally delivered his findings on the death of Dr. David Kelly to an expectant British nation. The amount of material unearthed by his inquiry had, in the opinion of almost everyone, exposed the government’s complicity in the circumstances that led Kelly to take his own life, as well as failures in editorial standards within the BBC. Even if Hutton failed to deliver the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, the nation was ready for the worst: a critical judgement on the standards of its public life.

In what was a moment of supreme irony, the nation did indeed get its worst-case scenario, but not one anyone had foreseen. Instead of a balanced judgement, weighing the facts and laying blame on both sides, Hutton delivered a whitewash of government worthy of a west end farce. The collective gasp of horror and disbelief as the country was robbed of its moment of integrity was audible. In its wake, the ruling left palpable confusion about its implications.

As Hutton reeled out his judgements, the travesty of justice began as a trickle and became an unstoppable flood. Throughout, he laid huge emphasis on the fact that the government did not insert the 45-minute claim into the September 2002 dossier knowing it to be false. This was the original charge BBC journalist Andrew Gilligan made once, but only once, before his later broadcasts were revised on that fateful day in May 2003. This mistake was conceded by Gilligan and the BBC months ago and was no longer news. However, Hutton focused on this wrongdoing to the almost complete exclusion of everything else. He stated that, given that it was not in the remit of his inquiry to assess whether or not the intelligence claim for Iraqi deployment of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) within 45 minutes was reliable, we had to take it on good faith that it was, on the basis that senior members of intelligence and government believed it to be so. In so ruling, Hutton completely ignored reams of evidence revealed by his inquiry showing frantic attempts by the government and intelligence services to do exactly what Kelly alleged and the BBC had broadcast: to “sex up” a dossier in order to make the case for war more convincing. But such evidence was to no avail. Gilligan was lynched for his mistake and the government was let off scot-free.

And so it went on. The government, it seems, was guilty of no “underhand” strategy to name Dr. Kelly in their war with the BBC over the veracity of Gilligan’s story, but merely recognised that it was inevitable that at some point his name would get into the public domain. Any steps they took which led to Kelly’s name getting out were not a strategy for outing him, but an attempt to head off charges of a cover up should they have protected his identity. This is despite the fact that the decision to name him was taken at top-level government meetings. Indeed, Blair himself is on record testifying to the inquiry that he took full responsibility for the naming of Kelly, while Alistair Campbell – who was waging a personal vendetta against the BBC – states in his diary of the time that the BBC would be severely damaged if Gilligan’s source were named.

We also know that Kelly’s name actually emerged through a macabre form of 20 questions played between the Ministry of Defence (MoD) press office and lobby journalists. But none of this evidence appeared to have made any impression on Hutton at all. Thus, despite conceding that having his name leaked to the press was one factor leading Kelly to take his own life, Hutton completely failed to account for that leak, and thus, for who was responsible for putting Kelly under that level of stress.

The only criticism of the government conceded by Hutton appeared to be the failure by the MoD to let Kelly know in adequate time that his name had been leaked to the press. But Hutton was very quick to point out that in all other respects the MoD had treated Kelly well, who after all, he reminded us, had acted without authorisation in speaking to the press at all. In contrast, the BBC had behaved with serious impropriety. Gilligan’s original claim that the government knew the 45-minute intelligence was wrong was a grave mistake, which was then compounded by the failure of the BBC to check the original story, or to apologise to the government and retract the claim. The implication is obvious: in refusing to retract the story sooner, it was the BBC rather than the government that created the momentum for Gilligan’s source to be named, and were thus responsible for the focus on Kelly himself.

It is clear that Gilligan made a mistake in his use of language in the original broadcast, and under sustained pressure from the government, the BBC failed to follow up the issue with sufficient rigor. But Hutton’s focus on these failings to the complete exclusion of any culpability on the part of the government is risible. Hutton explicitly failed to deal with the fact that there was anything of substance in Kelly’s accusations; he failed to acknowledge that the government pursued a campaign against the BBC and that the outing of Kelly was crucial to the interests of that campaign. He thus also completely failed David Kelly himself, who probably took his own life because he faced the prospect of losing his job and his reputation. The fact that Hutton concluded his report with a brief eulogy to Kelly and praised his dedicated public service was the final hollow ring of a performance that proved to be utterly hollow from start to finish.

The reactions to Hutton’s findings were equally stark. The journalists assembled to hear Hutton’s live broadcast sat in stunned silence at what they had just heard. Unsurprisingly, the government were absolutely triumphant. Blair was soon in Parliament, seeming to fight back the emotion as he testified that the Hutton report showed, beyond dispute, that the claim that Blair was a liar “was the real lie.” Demanding apologies from those who had ever said otherwise, Blair must have thought that, finally, he had come up smelling of roses.

At the BBC, in contrast, the effects of Hutton’s findings were catastrophic. Within hours, heads began to roll, beginning with Chairman Gavyn Davies, followed by Greg Dyke, the Director General, and then Andrew Gilligan himself. However, after that calamitous moment of panic, the BBC now appears to be retrenching.

While it is right that the BBC defends its corner, the government has very effectively used the Hutton report to force the organisation onto the back foot. At the same time, Hutton’s glowing conclusions on Blair and his allies make it much harder for anyone else to make Blair responsible for his actions in relation to the war on Iraq, and beyond.

At issue in all of this is the fact that the worst-case scenario of Hutton has only revealed what was already obvious – but it was something the British people had failed to fully grasp or come to terms with. Ever since Bush and Blair took the decision to invade Iraq, the government has blatantly disregarded the wishes of the people, has refused to submit to objective scrutiny, and has set up public forums in the service of the maintenance of their own position. Yet, through all this, public opinion has consistently wobbled about the virtues of the war on Iraq. While nobly opposed in March 2003 – but only if the UN failed to back action - by the summer, a majority had swung around to the war, and were willing to buy Blair’s post-facto line that it made little difference whether or not there were WMDs in Iraq, since getting rid of Saddam Hussein was a thoroughly good thing. Moreover, not capable of making up their own minds about the evidence from the Hutton inquiry, many were content to reserve their judgement of Blair until the announcement of Hutton’s conclusions.

The failure of Hutton to deliver a balanced judgement reveals the wider failure of British political culture to face facts. In some ways, everyone is culpable in this mockery of justice: Labour MPs who were gung ho for war, a Tory opposition baying for Saddam’s blood one minute and accusing Blair of lying about the reasons he took us to war the next, a national press more concerned with power politics in the Westminster village than with basic questions about armed invasion, and a public content, despite all their reservations, to hedge their bets and watch high quality footage of Operation Shock and Awe broadcast by, yes, the BBC. Any attempt at a real national debate over the invasion of Iraq has been repeatedly squandered. It remains to be seen whether the calls for a public inquiry into the reasons Britain went to war will be heard at all, and if so, whether that too will turn out to be another exercise in spin and scapegoating.

But in painfully exposing just how rigged UK public culture has become, Hutton’s report may become the catalyst needed for the far more fundamental shift needed if we are to finally face the fact that Britain launched an overtly imperialist war at the beginning of the twenty first century, on an ex-colony whose independence was at least grounded in the rhetoric of post imperialism, if not its reality. Ironically, Hutton has deprived people of their capacity to endlessly sit on the fence. Denied any possibility of the establishment policing itself, the people now need to assert themselves. Hutton’s findings may leave the integrity of the establishment in tatters, but it could finally force the electorate to make the judgement on this government that they have been avoiding for so long.

Full coverage of the Hutton Inquiry and original documents and testimonies can be found at:

The Guardian Special Report: David Kelly

Kate Prendergast is a British freelance researcher and journalist with a particular interest in African politics and development.

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• The Hutton Inquiry: Blair’s Iraq Policy on the Line