Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

Carla Lockhart Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 18th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

At the outset, let me restate unequivocally that we DUP Members will always stand with the innocent victims and survivors of terrorism in Northern Ireland. We will stand with the families whose loved ones were cut down by a ruthless and bloody terrorist campaign. Their pain has not diminished, and neither will our determination to defend truth, justice and moral clarity.

We continue to hear attempts to justify or sanitise and romanticise terrorism. We hear repeatedly from Sinn Féin’s leadership, the self-proclaimed First Minister for all and Mary Lou McDonald, that there was somehow no alternative to the IRA’s barbaric campaign of violence, and that it was justified. Justified? That is an affront to every innocent family whose loved one was murdered. There was always an alternative to murder; there was always an alternative to placing bombs under cars; and there was always an alternative to shooting innocent men, women and children.

I want to take the House back to two significant events in 1987: the IRA bombing of the service of remembrance at the cenotaph in Enniskillen, killing 12 people and injuring at least 60 more; and the Special Air Service’s engagement of heavily armed terrorists in Loughgall in my constituency. Which one of these incidents do Members think was granted a public inquiry? It was not the murder of innocents and the injuring of many more. Instead an inquiry was granted into the heavily armed terror gang, which was rightly engaged with and eliminated by the security forces, who saved countless lives in the process. Such is the subversion of the legacy process in Northern Ireland that the murder of innocents at Enniskillen has never had a public inquiry.

In recent times, the Secretary of State visited Loughgall and heard directly from innocent victims of the IRA’s East Tyrone brigade, one of the most brutal, ruthless killing wings of the IRA. He spoke with two men whose families endured unimaginable suffering at the hands of some of the IRA’s most notorious killers, and their testimonies were powerful and deeply moving. The East Tyrone brigade were not freedom fighters, but a heavily armed terror unit. Having already killed hundreds of innocent people, they mounted a killing operation at Loughgall, intending to obliterate any RUC officer in that station. They never paused in their murderous intent. They did not stop to give any officer an opportunity to walk away. Terrorism must never be sanitised or justified. Those who defended the innocent must never be sacrificed to appease those who glorify violence.

[Sammy Wilson]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the Secretary of State’s promises to the House mean that the Bill would enable some of those people and their supporters to be included on the victims advisory group? Indeed, if the Secretary of State consulted the Justice Minister in Northern Ireland, the leader of the Alliance party, she would say that they should be included, because they are just as much innocent victims as the people whom they killed.

[Carla Lockhart]

Absolutely. That was a point well made.

This Bill speaks of inquests, and we firmly believe that every family deserves a full and fair investigation, but Loughgall—really? Not only has that event been before the European Court of Human Rights, where the UK was found to be justified, but there is to be a second inquest. How does that make innocent victims feel? There must be no more vexatious pursuit of the security forces, and this Bill does not protect them. Only 10% of troubles-related deaths were caused by the security forces, and almost all of those occurred in engagements with terrorists, yet the narrative we hear is deliberately inverted. There is no comparison—none—between terrorists and those who stood as a human shield in their path. The SAS soldiers who served in Loughgall deserve this Government’s full support.

The Government have allowed the Irish Government an entirely disproportionate role in shaping legacy, while innocent victims in Northern Ireland feel sidelined. Let us be very clear: the Irish state has its own legacy—a dark, uncomfortable legacy—that it has yet to confront with honesty or transparency. That same state’s own tribunal, the Smithwick tribunal, found collusion between members of the Garda Síochána and the IRA on the murders of Chief Superintendent Harry Breen and Superintendent Bob Buchanan. Those two senior Royal Ulster Constabulary officers were ambushed and executed after information was passed by the Irish police to terrorists. It was the same with Ian Sproule, the 23-year-old from Castlederg. These are not isolated incidents. Across border areas, families have credible concerns about the Irish state’s failures—failures to arrest, to extradite, and to share intelligence, and failures that allowed terrorists to flee across the border and live openly.

We will stand with every innocent family whose loved one was murdered. We will stand with the RUC, with the Ulster Defence Regiment, with our veterans, and with the SAS. Terrorism was wrong. It was never justified, and it cannot be sanitised.

Northern Ireland Troubles Bill (Carry-over)

Carla Lockhart Excerpts

Carry-over motion
Monday 27th April 2026 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

I appreciate the opportunity to take part in this debate on the carry-over motion. We are here this evening as a direct consequence of the failure of this Government to honour their commitment to repeal and replace the legacy Act, to deliver on a manifesto commitment through a two-year Session of Parliament, and to bring with them the victims from Northern Ireland and veterans right throughout the United Kingdom.

This is not a failure of our making. The Secretary of State talks about and laments the fact that the Tories lost the support of all parties in Northern Ireland, but I see little support for the process that the people of Northern Ireland and veterans right across the United Kingdom have had to endure over the last two years. Time after time after time, we heard the Secretary of State talk of safeguards for veterans. Time after time after time, we heard him and the Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, who is sat beside him, indicate that those safeguards would protect veterans in the United Kingdom, yet here we have it—the Secretary of State has had to open up. He has had to tell us, as the Prime Minister confirmed to me, that he is going to bring forward further amendments to do what he said was already done. He has lost the confidence of veterans and victims.

We have talked about and asked the Secretary of State about equivalence. How can there be equivalence between somebody who donned a uniform, did service and made sacrifices legally and lawfully in this country and others who donned a balaclava, took an oath of allegiance to evil and sought to destroy our nation and all those in it? Can there be equivalence? No. Yet today, the Secretary of State says that he will bring forward amendments, and we are asked to support a carry-over motion on a process that has lost the confidence of the people it is meant to bring with it. That is a shame.

[Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

My right hon. Friend is making a very powerful point. Despite the promised raft of amendments, this Bill does not and will never protect those who put on uniform and stood between good and evil—the bloodthirsty terrorists. When the East Tyrone killing machine of the IRA was taken out at Loughgall, it saved countless lives, and it was the same at Coagh. People have had enough of the hounding of those who served, and they have had enough of this Government bending the knee to Dublin. It is time that we stand up for our veterans, not throw them to the wolves.

[Gavin Robinson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The Secretary of State dismisses the allegation that this is all about Dublin, but what was the clarion call over the last week? There was a British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference this week, and he knows that he is under pressure from Dublin to show progress, but what have we got from them? Nothing more than hollow words.

The Dublin Government said that they committed to information retrieval. How many requests have they accepted from the Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery? None. They have given no answers to any victims in Northern Ireland. The Irish Government have more secrets locked away in their drawers than lectures that they choose to give to this House. They still have an interstate case against this country. They promise lots; they deliver nothing.

Tonight, we are asked to support a carry-over motion. The amendment paper for this Bill, containing 49 pages of amendments from myself, my hon. Friends and hon. Members throughout this House. Although the Secretary of State was confident about this Bill, he now indicates that he is going to bring forward a substantial number of amendments. He would be better off scrapping the Bill and bringing back a Bill that can command the confidence of victims and veterans.

I listened to the powerful contribution of the Chair of the Northern Ireland Committee, the hon. Member for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi), who is no longer in her place. She will remember that one of the most startling experiences we had as a Committee was talking to victims who asked us this question: “Is the Secretary of State going to agree to early release for dissident republican prisoners?” On 21 May last year, he said to me that

“there are no such plans”—[Official Report, 21 May 2025; Vol. 767, c. 1011.]

yet that engagement continues. Worse, the Northern Ireland Office has now appointed a lady called Fleur Ravensbergen, who is engaging with the New IRA, who attacked Dunmurry police station just yesterday. Through their interlocutors and the International Red Cross, they are asking the Secretary of State to offer them early release. I say: shame!