Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill

Debate between Lord Blair of Boughton and Lord Morrow

Report stage
Wednesday 21st June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blair of Boughton (CB)]

My Lords, I will not detain the House much on this issue and Amendment 63, to which my name is attached, because I am really here to talk about Amendment 31, the Kenova amendment, which we will come to later on. I just want to remind noble Lords of the shocking effects of letters of comfort. We are about to repeat that same mistake if we continue with this process and do not do something to get Amendment 63 through the House on Monday.

[Lord Morrow (DUP)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 61A, tabled by me and my noble friends Lord Dodds and Lord Weir. My noble friend Lord Dodds has already spoken very eloquently on this, but I will add some comments.

Amendment 61A would require

“an individual to be disengaged from activity which would be reasonably regarded as precluding reconciliation in order to be eligible for immunity from prosecution”.

Earlier, I tried to push the Minister a little on this, because although reconciliation is laced through the Bill, its definition is anything but clear. I still feel strongly that the definition should be in the Bill. However, we are where we are.

Admittedly, the Government have brought forward new proposals allowing immunity to be revoked in incidents involving glorification of terror, as my noble friend Lord Dodds said. It is very disturbing when one watches our television screens or reads a newspaper to see leading, prominent politicians elegising the past—murder—and commemorating those who were intercepted by the security forces while carrying out murder, or who were blown up by their own bomb. In an age of reconciliation, how can this continue? Yet those same people tell us that they will be a First Minister for everybody.

That is the strangest way of setting out. If that is their idea of reconciliation, then I no longer understand plain English. Surely it is time for the Government to take a long hard look at this situation. As has already been said by others, this is not good legislation. It is bad legislation, and it has no support back in Northern Ireland from anyone who has spoken publicly about it. I have not read of support for this legislation, yet the Government are intent on pushing on and pushing it through. Those of us who have these great concerns are therefore making an honest attempt to make this less bad. That might not be good grammar, but it is the best way that I can say it.

We want the Government to stop and think. Admittedly, they brought forward new proposals allowing immunity to be revoked for the glorification of terror, but this does not go far enough in capturing activities that do not necessarily constitute offending, but which will cause deep harm to victims, survivors and their families. If this Bill is about reconciliation, it must take into account the hurt caused not only 30 years ago but right up to recent times. Some tell us that we have every right to remember our dead, and maybe that is true, but we have absolutely no moral right to glorify those who carried out these evil deeds of terror. “Reconciliation” is in the title of the Bill, but that seems to be as far as the Government are willing to go.

The ICRIR will be statutorily required to oversee an amnesty process which runs contrary to reconciliation and which is opposed almost unilaterally by victims. Any sense that the ICRIR can deliver on its primary objective is diminished from the word go. It should be made clear in Clause 18 that one condition for immunity, applied not just at the point of application but thereafter, is that an individual is not engaged in activity which can reasonably be regarded as precluding reconciliation by glorifying terror and violence, eroding support for the rule of the law or traumatising victims yet again.