§ 27. Dame Irene Wardasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, in view of the access to the files of the Special Operations Executive granted to the author of a book, details of which have been sent to him, on what date the files were closed to other writers and on what grounds.
§ The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Lord John Hope)Special Operations Executive files have at no time been generally available to authors in the sense which the hon. Lady implies. The grant of access on the occasion in November, 1947, to which she refers was subsequently considered to have been ill-advised in respect of precedent, and for reasons of security no further access has been or can be allowed.
§ Dame Irene WardI thank my hon. Friend for that information, but would it interest him to know that the files were closed in 1952, after the publication of the "Starr Affair"? Will he kindly 1071 explain the relationship of the "Starr Affair" to the closing of the files, which would be of great interest to many people, because it has nothing to do with security at all, the book having gone through the usual security channels?
§ Lord John HopeI have answered the hon. Lady's Question.