Hi Mark,
To be honest I just checked with the mechanic who removed the EGR valve and he say's he's not sure. I'm thinking as a quick way to see if it is blocked I could look at AMM response as I open it using actuator tests.
I'm trying to see the logic behind a blocked EGR causing the problem of an air leak, but I'm not sure what in total the ECU sees to log this fault code.

Thanks for the suggestion, will report my findings.

Mark R