Publication of a report into the murder of former LVF leader Billy Wright will be left “in the hands” of the Northern Ireland Office, not the panel assigned to preside over the inquiry.

At the conclusion of submissions into the 156-day inquiry, Chairman Lord MacLean revealed it was the panel’s intention to publish their report next year “free of supervision” from the NIO but since that “can't be achieved” they will submit the completed report to Secretary of State Shaun Woodward while issuing a statement at the same time.

He explained discussions had taken place with NIO officials who had “expressed a wish” that the panel should “first submit the report to them in draft”.

“Our preferred option, for reasons I need not go into but they are fairly obvious, is to publish our own report free of supervision by the Northern Ireland Office,” he said.

“Since that, it would appear, can’t be achieved, we have decided to submit our completed report to the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whenever it is ready and couple that with the issue of a public statement.

“Publication, as you will appreciate, will then be in the hands of the Northern Ireland Office and passes beyond our control and our timing, but we are very keen to bring this Inquiry to an end with as early a publication of our report as we can.”

Billy Wright was killed by INLA inmates at the Maze prison in December 1997.

The inquiry was set up to determine if there was any evidence of state collusion in relation to his death after claims by Wright’s father David in a book that a senior RUC officer made a remark that his son would be removed because he was a threat to the peace process.

The claim was made in Chris Anderson’s book The Billy Boy, and was meant to have taken place following the fallout from the 1996 Drumcree parade.

Since the inquiry began damning evidence has emerged that prison chiefs ordered the destruction of thousands of prisoner files following the LVF leader’s death.

It has also revealed that vital intelligence documents relating to plans by the INLA to murder Billy Wright were missing from police records.

Solicitors John McAtamney and Co, who are acting on behalf of David Wright, told the Belfast Telegraph last night their client had been campaigning for a long time to find out what happened and wanted all the evidence to be made public as soon as possible.

“Mr Wright wishes to see swift and complete publication of the contents of the inquiry report and hopes there would be no suppression of wrong doing by the Northern Ireland Office.

“He said hoped he would not have to resort to court action as he was forced to do with the Cory report to ensure publication of the Inquiries findings.”

A spokesman from the NIO said under the Inquiries Act, the Secretary of State was responsible for publishing the report.

“The Inquiry asked whether he would consider delegating that responsibility to the Inquiry Chairman. The Secretary of State was happy to do this in principle.

“But he has duties that he cannot ignore: he needs to ensure that publication does not put people's lives at risk or damage national security — he could not delegate responsibility for publication until he was satisfied that there were no risks of this kind.”