Technically it WAS the whole cabinet. Of course, because he was the PM and leader, the brilliance of the silver-tongued Blair meant he was first among equals, and carried great authority amongst (most of) the cabinet then.

And because of the rest of the then cabinet’s desperate need to let us keep calling it “Blair’s War”, they usually avoid reminding us of their collective responsibility.

There are also arguments about how much “evidence” they were shown by the Attorney General at the time, on the question of legality.

The Straws, Browns etc of this world don’t dwell on this aspect much either because if they do, and are seen to have kept quiet when they might have insisted on more information, they could be accused of acquiescence, weakness or even incompetence.

But the whole cabinet IS responsible apart from the one who walked out – Robin Cook, and he, sadly, is no longer with us.

Why do you think they are not keen on deeper investigation when some might think that would give them the opportunity to hang it all round Blair’s neck and his alone? Imho, because if such a search found against Blair, it would also be found that they are all guilty parties, if only by negligence.

Not that there SHOULD be a deeper investigation at this time, anyway. This call is all political manouvering from the Lib Dem/Scot Nats/ Welsh Nats, as was the Cash For Honours nonsense.

I recall hearing recently that there is no record kept as to how individual cabinet members actually vote. Someone asked how Brown had voted in the Iraq cabinet meeting. The answer was, ‘we don’t know’. I reckon he voted for. He recently implied as much, to be fair to him. And if he hadn’t – somehow I reckon that information would have slipped out some time between 2003 and 2007!

Blair has never, EVER tried to pass responsibility for this decision to others or even to spread the load. People might, possibly correctly, accuse him of being presidential, but that was a style he developed, partly it seems, due to the quality of his cabinets, much of the time. But he WASN’T the ‘president’ – and it was up to the rest of the Cabinet to make sure he knew it, if they were so anti the invasion.

If they didn’t, it must be because they too were convinced by his arguments.