Last Wednesday I went straight from Prime Minister’s Questions to RAF Brize Norton to catch a VC10 to Iraq. I wanted to thank some of the British troops facing Christmas far from home and also meet as many people as I could in Baghdad to gain a better understanding of the challenges facing the Coalition Provisional Authority. The VC10 was full of a mixture of regulars and reservists. Some were on their first trip to the region. There were also several police officers on their way to train the Iraqi police. They were all pretty cheerful.
After less than six hours we landed in Basra, headquarters of the Multinational Division (South-East) where most of the British contingent are based. We had an hour and a half to sleep ‘ I was privileged to occupy the accommodation recently vacated by Nell McAndrew in rather controversial circumstances. Then we were off to Baghdad.
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