Make Bassingbourn Report Public ASAP

There's a demand to make the MoD report into Bassingbourn to be made public as soon as possible.

Councillors have called for the findings of yesterday's Ministry of Defence (MoD) review report to the Secretary of State for Defence, Michael Fallon MP, into the circumstances behind the recent alleged assaults in Cambridge by Libyan cadet soldiers, to be made public immediately after the Christmas break.

Talks were held on 1 December between Cambridge City Council, South Cambridgeshire District Council, Cambridgeshire County Council and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) as part of the MoD review initiated by the Prime Minister.

The terms of reference for that review were shared with councillors by email after the meeting and its findings are due to be shared with the Secretary of State for Defence on Friday.

Now, Cllr Lewis Herbert, Leader of Cambridge City Council, has written on behalf of the three councils to the Secretary of State.

Cllr Herbert said:

"We are making these terms of reference available because we believe they should be shared with residents. We are also asking the Secretary of State to make sure that the review report is published in an open and transparent way early in January.

It's important that, however difficult the findings of the review may be for particular institutions, the lessons are learnt and acted upon from this shocking episode.

We have also made clear that we still want an independent inquiry to follow the MoD review and we have asked the Secretary of State to support us in this, because this affected Cambridge and Bassingbourn, not just MoD property.

The public across the UK, but particularly in Cambridge, need to have full confidence and assurance that failings will not be repeated and that their safety will be always be the top priority for our defence forces in future."