SNP and Labour have traded blows after MPs voted overwhelmingly against a call to investigate Tony Blair over the Iraq War.

Former SNP leader Alex Salmond angrily accused Labour and Conservative MPs of learning nothing from the 2003 invasion.

But Labour politicians said that they would not let their former party leader become a “scapegoat”.

Mr Blair's ex-spin doctor Alastair Campbell also rang a radio phone-in programme hosted by Mr Salmond to suggest he was a conspiracy theorist.

Mr Campbell said that it did not matter how many inquiries into the war were held because "people like Alex are absolutely determined to believe there was some kind of lie".

The SNP-led motion had called for a committee of MPs to probe alleged discrepancies between Mr Blair’s public and private statements in the run up to the invasion.

It also said that Chilcot, the official Iraq inquiry, had provided “substantial evidence of misleading information” from Mr Blair.

The Commons voted by 439 votes to 70 to oppose the motion, although it was backed by a handful of Labour and Conservative MPs.

Earlier, Mr Salmond described Labour MPs who justified Mr Blair’s actions as “desperate to defend the indefensible”.

He said that he believed the public had been "grievously misled into that disastrous conflict" by Mr Blair.

He pointed to a note written by Mr Blair assuring then US President George Bush that the UK would be “with you, whatever”.

Mr Salmond told MPs that the message was evidence that the former prime minister had pledged to support an invasion before the Commons vote.

He also claimed that current Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn would back the motion if he was still a backbench MP.

But Labour MPs pointed to comments by Sir John Chilcot, who led the inquiry, who recently told MPs: “I absolve him [Blair] from a personal and demonstrable decision to deceive parliament or the public.”

Former Labour minister Ben Bradshaw told MPs: “The lie that our former Prime Minister lied has finally been laid to rest and the SNP can’t stand it.”

Ian Austin, a former adviser to Gordon Brown, said that Mr Salmond was “a disgrace” for failing to attack the brutality of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s regime.

Shadow foreign office minister Fabian Hamilton, who voted against war in 2003, also defended Mr Blair, saying that he did not believe the former Prime Minister had acted in bad faith.

On the Conservative benches, former Tory cabinet minister Ken Clarke warned Mr Salmond against what he described as "personalising" the Chilcot report.

The motion was non-binding but would have put pressure on committee members to launch a probe.

Mr Salmond later told radio listeners that Brexit Secretary David Davis had been asked on his appointment if he would give up support for an attempt to hold Mr Blair in contempt.

The former First Minister claimed that the “establishment” wanted to avoid setting the precedent of holding former Prime Ministers to account.

In a statement he said: "This vote demonstrates that those who voted against this cross-party motion have failed to learn any lessons from history and from the Chilcot report. It is like deja vu, it was the Tory and Labour frontbenches that took us into the illegal war and it is the Tory and Labour frontbenches again who have failed to hold the former Prime Minister to account."

The debate had triggered a war within the parliamentary Labour party and the party's leadership.

Earlier this week Labour MPs voted at a private meeting for a three line-whip on the motion.

But the party's shadow cabinet agreed only to impose a one-line whip, the weakest kind, indicating that MPs did not have to attend.