I'm still recuperating from the Mudcat gathering in Portaferry, but it's time I showed my face in this thread to take my lumps. Not only are there many posts here, but some are very long, so I've not yet absorbed them all. Suffice to say that I still disagree with Teribus quite a bit, but I must say he's chucked a lot of useful info into the melting pot.

On the central point of my challenge to T'bus, I was clearly wrong. When the Beeb corporately ringed its wagons round Gilligan I was sure they must have checked his notes - maybe even listened to Susan Watts's tape - and concluded that Gilligan was bomb-proof. I find it quite incredible that they rushed to defend him against a direct challenge, from the PM's office of all places, on the strength of his word alone.

I am also amazed that Gilligan defended his 6.07 broadcast, given what we now know, and given that he himself did not repeat his major inaccuracies in any of his further 16 broadcasts that day. He should have come clean at once.

Until two days ago I was at a loss to know how the Today editor, Kevin Marsh, had clung to his job. He was savaged by Hutton, and rightly, or so I thought. However I then saw this in the Guardian, which says, for the benefit of those who don't want to follow the link, that contrary to Hutton's report, Marsh did insist on Gilligan scripting his piece, and did himself check that script before broadcast. Moreover it was a convention of Marsh's editorship that any reporter engaged in a two-way should broadly follow the script. Gilligan, in that fateful early-morning broadcast, chose to depart from the script.

I don't know if the Guardian story is true - Marsh is consulting lawyers, and if he has a case, he will no doubt pursue it. It does seem unreasonable that Hutton should have subjected Marsh to criticism without having called him as a witness.

So much for the Beeb. In every other way I am disappointed in Hutton, who has shown himself worthy only to follow in the tradition of Lords Denning and Widgery in dancing to the government's tune. The Guardian did a series of interviews with members of the public who had queued to attend the inquiry and who had been there every day. All of them were surprised, astonished or angry, in varying degree, that Hutton had not a word to say about the failings of government.

The one thing that can be said for Hutton is that he put all the evidence on the internet for all to see. It has devalued his own report, in that we are all capable of reaching our own views on the evidence. For that reason the enormous popular reaction against Hutton is far more credible and informed than would ever have been possible in the past. And unfortunately for Blair, the feeling that Hutton was a grotesque whitewash does him direct damage too. The image of the "straight kind of guy" is gone for good.

One last thought. Something has given Blair a terrific shot in the arm. As someone who has been repulsed by his policies and cringe-making evangelising, I have to say that from his encounter with Paxman and the students on Newsnight onwards, he has been on stronger form than I've ever seen him. The Newsnight performance can't be ascribed to the Hutton factor, as it pre-dated the report, unless maybe he had early notice that he was in the clear.