The House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee investigated two dossiers published by the government in the run-up to war, one of which included the headline-grabbing claim that Saddam's weapons of mass destruction were deployable within 45 minutes.

Deputies also probed a BBC report quoting an intelligence source who said that an official file published in September had been "sexed up" by inserting the 45-minute claim, despite the reservations of Britain's intelligence services.

A report by the parliamentary committee said the 45-minute claim was given undue prominence and said the language used in the dossier was "more assertive than that traditionally used in intelligence documents".

"We conclude that the 45-minute claim did not warrant the prominence given to it in the dossier, because it was based on intelligence from a single, uncorroborated source. We recommend that the government explain why the claim was given such prominence," the deputies said in their report.

The committee pointed out that without access to the original intelligence it could not know if it had been "faulty or misrepresented".

The BBC's story that Blair's office beefed up information from intelligence services to persuade a sceptical public of the case for war has prompted a bitter row between the public broadcaster and the Labour government.

Meanwhile Blair has been under fire for weeks over his handling of the Iraq conflict, with polls finding that voters are losing trust in him.

But the parliamentary inquiry, on which deputies from Blair's ruling Labour party have a majority, cleared any minister of misleading parliament.

The committee concluded that "in the absence of reliable evidence that intelligence personnel have either complained about or sought to distance themselves from the contents of the (September) dossier, allegations of politically-inspired meddling cannot credibly be established".

The deputies also cleared Blair's key aide and powerful director of communications Alastair Campbell of exerting "improper influence" in the drafting of the September file.

However, the committee was scathing about a second government dossier, published in February, saying Blair had inadvertently "misrepresented its status" by telling parliament it contained "further intelligence" without having been informed of its provenance.

Labelled the "dodgy dossier" by the press and politicians, that file featured in part an uncredited paper by a post-graduate student in the United States.

"We conclude that the effect of the February dossier was almost wholly counterproductive. By producing such a document the government undermined the credibility of their case for war," which began on March 20 and led to the downfall of Saddam's regime, deputies said.

They added it was "wholly unacceptable" for the government to plagiarise work without attribution. It was "fundamentally wrong" for such a document to be presented to parliament without ministerial oversight.

The inquiry also said that "continuing disquiet and unease about the claims made in the September dossier are unlikely to be dispelled unless more evidence of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programme comes to light".

There were no signs Monday that the controversy was over, with both the government and the BBC claiming they had been vindicated by the parliamentary inquiry.

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw called on the BBC to apologise for its reporting on the September dossier.

Speaking to journalists in Downing Street, Straw said the committee's report had demonstrated that "the central and most damaging allegation against the government, that we inserted the 45-minute intelligence into the dossier whilst knowing it to be untrue and against the wishes of the intelligence agencies, has been shown to be false".

But the BBC said in a statement: "We believe the decision to highlight the circumstances surrounding the 45-minutes claim has been vindicated."

Blair's official spokesman, meanwhile, refused to accept the committee's conclusion that the premier had misrepresented to parliament the status of the "dodgy dossier" released in February.

WAR.WIRE