Thames eventually agreed to commission an independent inquiry into the programme (the first such inquiry into an individual programme), to be conducted by two people with no connection to either Thames or the IBA; to that end, Thames engaged Lord Windlesham and Richard Rampton, QC. Windlesham was a Conservative politician, privy councillor, and former minister in the Home Office and then the Northern Ireland Office; he also had experience of television journalism, having previously managed two television companies. Rampton was a leading barrister specialising in media law and libel. The inquiry's terms of reference were "to inquire into the making and screening of 'Death on the Rock'", including its creation, production, content, and any effect it had had on the inquest. The report found that the tendency of the evidence presented in the programme was to suggest the terrorists had been unlawfully killed, and that it did not explore alternative explanations in any depth. Nevertheless, Windlesham and Rampton believed that the programme presented evidence for one possible explanation, but sought to raise questions rather than reach a conclusion. In analysing the content of the programme, they found that it allowed the witnesses to give their accounts in their own words rather than presenting them as established fact. Thus, they found that the content did not infringe any requirement for neutrality. The report scrutinised in detail the statements of the eyewitnesses who spoke on camera, including the parts of the interviews that were not included in the broadcast version of the programme. It found, with two exceptions, that the witnesses' statements were fairly represented in the programme. The exceptions were that the programme suggested that Bullock had not heard a warning, when he was in no position to hear whether such a warning was given or not; and that the commentary implied that all four witnesses who appeared on the programme had seen no threatening movements from the IRA members, when only two had been asked whether they witnessed such movements. Windlesham and Rampton also considered Asquez's statement and the journalists' decision to incorporate it into the programme. The report considered that the journalists acted reasonably in using the statement, despite Asquez's refusal to sign it, on the grounds that Asquez had given two separate, near-identical statements (including one to a lawyer), and that they considered it unlikely that somebody would invent such a dramatic account. Nonetheless, the report criticised the programme for not informing viewers of Asquez's refusal to sign the statement. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) made representations to the inquiry that "Death on the Rock" could potentially have had an adverse effect on the inquest on the same grounds that Howe had attempted to delay the broadcast.