Portrait of the Week – 6 September 2003

Mr Alastair Campbell confirmed that he was to resign as the Prime Minister’s director of com-munications and strategy. He is to be succeeded, at least in the first half of the title, by Mr David Hill, but there is to be a general musical-chairs in the department, about which Mr Peter Mandelson is said to have been consulted. The Hutton inquiry into the events surrounding the death of Dr David Kelly, the expert on Iraqi weapons, heard evidence from Mrs Janice Kelly his widow, who said, ‘He said several times over coffee, over lunch, over afternoon tea that he felt totally let down and betrayed’ – by the Ministry of Defence. His daughter, Miss Rachel Kelly, referring to a report by Mr Andrew Gilligan for which Dr Kelly was said to be the source, said, ‘He could not understand how Gilligan could make such forceful claims from the conversation they had had.’