Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill

(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)

Consideration of Commons amendments
Tuesday 12th September 2023 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Caine]

That this House do not insist on its Amendments 44D, 44E, 44F, 44G, 44H and 44J, to which the Commons have disagreed for their Reason 44K.

44K: Giving family members a role in whether immunity should be granted or not would critically undermine the effectiveness of delivering on the principal aim of this legislation.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Northern Ireland Office (Lord Caine) (Con)]

My Lords, last week your Lordships sent this legislation back to the other place after agreeing an opposition amendment with a majority of 11 votes. This was overturned the following day by the elected House by a majority of 83. It followed the rejection of an earlier amendment passed by this House with a majority of 92. I fully accept that this House has exercised its legitimate constitutional role by asking the other place to reconsider. It has done so and very decisively answered on both occasions with overwhelming majorities. I therefore respectfully hope that your Lordships now agree to this Bill being passed, over one year and two months since I introduced it.

The legacy Bill introduced to the other place at the start of the Session last year took on a very different form to the Bill before us today. The changes brought about by the Government and extensively influenced by your Lordships over the course of the Bill’s passage mean that the Bill that I hope will receive Royal Assent is a more robust piece of legislation, designed to deliver better outcomes for victims and survivors of the Troubles. The current mechanisms for addressing legacy matters work for only a very small number of people rather than the overwhelming majority and where established criminal justice processes are increasingly unlikely to deliver the outcomes that people desire, particularly in respect of prosecutions. This legislation will provide more information to more people in a shorter timeframe than is possible under current mechanisms.

Should this Bill become law, which I hope it will, it is for the commission that it establishes to build on the framework that the legislation provides by developing, independently of the UK Government, clear structures, guidance and protocols regarding how it will work in practice. However, the new commission will need time to do this. While I recognise that this has been a difficult process, I encourage everybody to give Sir Declan Morgan KC and his team a fair wind, to demonstrate that the commission can deliver effectively for families. The UK Government will provide whatever support that they can in this endeavour while of course respecting the operational independence of the commission, which has been significantly strengthened by your Lordships’ House. I hope that others can do the same. I beg to move.

[Lord Murphy of Torfaen (Lab)]

It has been a long time—well over a year, as the Minister said—and I continue to say that I do not blame the Government for one second for trying to resolve what is a hugely difficult issue. Of course they were right to do so, but they do not have the answer.

My right honourable friend the new shadow Secretary for Northern Ireland, Hilary Benn—I welcome him to his post and, incidentally, pay tribute to Peter Kyle, who did a great job over a couple of years—said in the Commons last week, quite rightly, that the Government have made changes that all of us welcome, including this House, but it simply is not enough.

The Minister mentioned the Divisions we have had in the last few weeks. Twice, this House—the majorities might not have been huge, but they were majorities nevertheless—has asked the House of Commons to look again at the central controversial issue of the Bill, which is conditional immunity. He is right, of course, that ultimately we have to give way to the elected House, but that does not alter the fact that this is a friendless Bill. In effect, it has no support in Northern Ireland at all. All my experience of Northern Ireland over the years is that, where there is no support for a Bill such as this, from all communities in Northern Ireland, it will not work. There should have been consensus.

The Government should put the Bill on hold—put it on ice, if you like. Wait until there is a restored Assembly and Executive. When we debate other issues affecting Northern Ireland on Thursday, we will perhaps hear that there has been progress on the possibility of restoration. The right place for this to be debated and discussed is Belfast, not London, so put it on hold. If that does not happen, a future Labour Government will undoubtedly repeal this legislation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Caine (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful, as always, to those who have spoken. I do not intend to follow the current fashion for making yet another Second Reading speech at this stage of the legislation’s proceedings. I will just pick up one point made by the noble Lord, Lord Murphy of Torfaen, when he referred to the role of the Northern Ireland Assembly in all this. He will recall that it was the Northern Ireland Executive, back in 2013, that invited Richard Haass and Meghan O’Sullivan in to try to deal with issues related to past flag parading. Of course, no consensus was forthcoming on that occasion. As I have reminded the House on so many occasions, the reason we ended up dealing with these issues as the UK Government and in Westminster is that after the Stormont House agreement, it was the then First Minister and Deputy First Minister who came to the Secretary of State and said that it was far too difficult for them to do in Stormont and asked us to do it in Westminster.

The noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Bennachie, asked me about the motivation for the legislation and what it is designed to achieve. I touched on this last week and in my comments in moving this Motion. It is primarily to get more information to victims and survivors of the Troubles about what happened to their loved ones, in a far shorter timeframe than we feel is possible under the current legacy mechanisms. It is about information recovery, where people want to access that information. That is the motivation behind the legislation. It is now incumbent on us to pass the Bill and give Sir Declan Morgan and his team the opportunity to make this a reality and to deliver for victims and survivors of the Troubles.

Motion A agreed.