“It has come to something,” he continued, “When the leading anti-war MP could get a fairer hearing in the Republican Senate than in the British House of Commons.

“I was thrown out of Parliament this evening just as I had given one example of the double standards that go to the heart of this matter. Anyone watching this would have seen Parliament plunged into disrepute as it absurdly decided - through agreeing my exclusion - that I am not permitted to point to those double standards or to criticise those who have produced this unjust report about me.

“We now have the absurdity in which the House of Commons has convinced itself, or at rather pretends that it has, that 10 MPs sat in a committee room somehow cease to be what they by definition are - highly political people who together constitute a political tribunal.

“The public know that is so; MPs, if they were being honest, know it; it’s only in the chamber of the House of Commons that you are not allowed to say so.

“I had much, much more to say about the report and the overarching question of who it is in this Iraq affair who has brought Parliament into disrepute. Instead, by voting to throw me out, the MPs present this evening chose to conduct a kangaroo court in my absence.

“They may be happy to close their ears to the truth. Most people in Britain - and abroad - are not.