UK:Kennedy calls on voters to deliver verdict on war

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Voters should use the next general election to deliver their verdict on the Iraq war, Charles Kennedy said yesterday in his closing speech to the Liberal Democrat conference. In a sustained attack on the prime minister's handling of the conflict, Mr Kennedy said the public would be galvanised by the issue at an election that could be just 225 days away.

In a 58-minute speech, widely hailed as the most effective of his leadership, he repeated his call for the prime minister to face the Commons on Iraq. In particular, he said Mr Blair had to tell MPs when he offered George Bush his support for the war on the grounds of regime change, as leaked documents suggest he did so in March 2002, a year before war started.

"It's time we got an answer. And if the prime minister still refuses, then the people can make their judgment because the ultimate verdict is the general election itself."

He suggested institutional reform was required to prevent a prime minister pursuing unilateral military action, without UN backing, on "an incomplete and false prospectus". "Never again should such supreme prime ministerial power be allowed to progress without sufficient checks and balances." Burnishing his party's anti-war credentials, he said: "From the outset, we have provided rational, principled and consistent opposition to the war in Iraq."

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/libdems2004/story/0,14992,1311720,00.html