1994 RAF Chinook Crash

Richard Foord Excerpts

Wednesday 26th November 2025 Westminster Hall

[Richard Foord (Honiton and Sidmouth) (LD)]

It is an honour to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Dowd, given your insight on matters of national security. I am grateful to the hon. Member for North Down (Alex Easton) for securing the debate today.

This summer, a constituent joined me in my surgery at Honiton and explained that she was the widow of one of the victims who had been killed in a helicopter crash in 1994. Her husband was one of the 29 security personnel who were killed when Chinook Zulu Delta 576, in which they were travelling, crashed over the Mull of Kintyre. In my speech, I want to focus on what has happened since: the years of uncertainty, the fragmented investigations, the unanswered questions and the decision to seal key documents away until 2094.

My constituent is now a member of the Chinook Justice Campaign, led by 24 of the 29 families who are seeking answers about the crash itself, but also accountability for way that it was handled in the aftermath. They have set out a long list of unanswered questions—a stark reminder of how much remains unresolved for the families—including: “Why were our loved ones placed on an aircraft that even the Ministry of Defence and its most experienced test pilots were prohibited from flying?” and “Were the passengers on board told that the proper authority in the Ministry of Defence had determined that the aircraft was not to be relied on in any way whatsoever?” After three decades, those are modest and entirely reasonable requests.

The withholding of information has denied families the answers that could have brought some closure to their grief. Across 31 years, six separate investigations have examined the Chinook crash, yet none has provided a full or coherent account of what happened. The original RAF board of inquiry in 1995 blamed the pilots without ever resolving the serious airworthiness concerns known about at the time. Later reviews, culminating in the 2011 Lord Philip review, overturned the negligence verdict but still did not address why the aircraft was allowed to fly despite being declared unairworthy by the MOD’s own testing centre in 1993.

Even subsequent parliamentary scrutiny and internal MOD examinations, including through the 2000s and the 2010s, left major questions unanswered. Those include how the false declaration of airworthiness was made, why crucial information was withheld from the pilots, and what is contained in the documents now sealed until 2094.

[Tessa Munt]

When the Minister replies, I wonder whether she might answer this question, with which I am sure my hon. Friend will agree. When did the MOD stop allowing so many critical personnel on one flight? Those on board included members of MI5, RUC special branch and the British Army intelligence corps, as well as Northern Ireland security experts—almost all the UK’s senior Northern Ireland intelligence capability on one flight. We know that in the case of the royal family, the monarch and the heir are not allowed to fly together. Will the Minister explain exactly when the MOD stopped the practice of putting everybody on one flight? Has that actually happened?

[Richard Foord]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that point. I understand that so many high-value, senior and experienced personnel would not be put on the same flight today. If we reflect on that collision in 1994, we have to ask why six inquiries have not brought clarity. Instead, families are left with a patchwork of findings, and gaps where the truth should be.

The Chinook Justice Campaign poses a crucial question: how can future tragedies be prevented through changes to oversight and accountability? That brings me to the Public Office (Accountability) Bill, which passed its Second Reading this month. Its central idea is that public servants should have a duty of candour—a legal requirement to act truthfully, to co-operate and to avoid the kind of defensive practices that have deepened the suffering of victims’ families in the past.

The Bill contains a significant exemption under clause 6: the duty of candour does not apply to the intelligence agencies or others who handle material falling within the definition of “security and intelligence” in section 1(9) of the Official Secrets Act 1989. I entirely understand why some agencies and the broader intelligence community might need to be exempt, but if certain institutions are to be exempt from a statutory duty of candour, Parliament must at least strengthen the independent mechanisms that can review and oversee sensitive decisions behind closed doors.

At present, that mechanism is the Intelligence and Security Committee, but its remit no longer reflects how all national security work is carried out across Government. In its 2022-23 annual report, the ISC warned that the

“failure to update its Memorandum of Understanding”

has allowed key intelligence-related functions to shift into policy Departments outside its oversight, creating what it called an “erosion of Parliamentary oversight”.

Families want to see the full truth and have urged MPs who represent them to call for relevant documents to be released where possible. Liberal Democrats support the families and are calling for the release of those sealed Chinook documents that can be released, and a judge-led public inquiry in due course with access to all relevant material, so that the unresolved questions about airworthiness and accountability can be answered. We are also urging the Government to follow through with a duty of candour on public bodies, which should of course include the Ministry of Defence, in which the Minister and I and the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Exmouth and Exeter East (David Reed), all served.

We need to ensure that bereaved families are never again forced to fight for decades to have basic transparency. Where documents relating to the Chinook crash can be released, they should be, so that families can finally understand the full truth of what happened and why. If there are elements relating to national security that genuinely cannot be made public, the Government must put in place trusted, independent parliamentary oversight with the authority to examine that material. For the sake of my constituent, and for every Chinook Zulu Delta 576 family still waiting for answers, we must not let this injustice endure for another generation.