Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 18th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alex Burghart]

I think the hon. Lady is misunderstanding my point. The point that I am making is that when it is clear that vexatious complaints and vexatious investigations can begin, then everyone who served feels under threat—[Interruption.] For the benefit of Hansard, the hon. Lady said from a sedentary position, “Are they vexatious?” It is very clear that the case that was heard in Belfast last month was a vexatious complaint. The judge said it was “ludicrous” and that it should never have come anywhere near the court, but for four years a member of the special forces was pursued, and all his comrades and colleagues thought that if such a thing could happen, they might have the same legal action brought against them in future.

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

The way in which the last intervention was made suggested that this is a numbers game based on the numbers who were out there in Northern Ireland. The fact is—[Interruption.] No, with respect, I actually served out there, and I can tell you something about this. The reality is that the British Army was sent to hold the peace against terrorists who set out to kill people deliberately for their own political ends. Is it not wrong to equate the two as though the numbers were ridiculous?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Before Alex Burghart responds, let me say that it is important that we keep the debate well-tempered. The term “you” should not be used by a senior Back Bencher.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

I rise to support the Opposition Front Bench in their concerns about the present legislation. Three facts stand out. First, the Bill does not protect veterans from criminal cases, even repeated ones. It essentially means that they are likely to be dragged through the criminal process multiple times if accused of wrongdoing or even asked to give evidence. Secondly, Labour’s protections for veterans can barely be called protections, and the Irish Government have denied that they exist at all. It remains unclear how they will work in practice to protect veterans, and the Irish Deputy Prime Minister Simon Harris has said that no additional protections will be given to veterans, so there is a conflict between the two parties to the agreement.

Thirdly, it remains unclear whether the protections for veterans in the new legacy deal will protect paramilitaries and terrorists alike. Interestingly, my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart) asked the Secretary of State that question at the Dispatch Box, and he never answered it. I would be grateful if at some point he, or the Minister when he gets up, would say whether the protections extend to both sides.

The main point that I want to make, having served in Northern Ireland, is how quickly people forget what a peculiar and terrible event it was—so peculiar to have British troops on the ground in the United Kingdom with British citizens all around them, having to keep the peace in a part of this United Kingdom. It seemed almost outrageous, but that was what we were called to do. We had strict rules of engagement, and those were very tough to follow at times because of the nature of the threat and what could happen around any corner. You never knew when you went to a house whether someone would be sniping or shooting at you, and that played on the senses and on the alertness of those soldiers. Sure, mistakes will have been made, but that was the very nature of the background in which that happened.

[Mr Calvin Bailey (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)]

The right hon. Member makes an important distinction about the manner in which we deployed our soldiers. What he has described is a policing action, and there are very different requirements for delivering scrutiny. Is he not incredulous that other Members of his party are conflating that with the concern that we would put those requirements on future veterans, who would be fighting a conflict where we hope they would be acting forwards in a way that is entirely different from what he described?

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith]

I will not follow the hon. Member down that road, because I have limited time and there is something I want to reflect on, but the reality is that many people and veterans believe that this will be a problem for future recruits.

I was, in actual fact, not in favour of the legislation passed by the previous Government because I felt that equating this by giving rights to both sides to avoid any prosecutions would not necessarily work. I was, however, persuaded in the final analysis by one particular case. The hon. Member for Foyle (Colum Eastwood) mentioned Robert Nairac. Robert Nairac was a very good friend of mine. I came to the conclusion that there was no way on earth that we would ever find out what actually happened to this brave soldier who served in Northern Ireland. We have had bits and pieces to relay the fact that he was almost certainly tortured and that he was executed, but we never get to know. His parents died not knowing and his family still wonder what happened to him. Was he ever buried? Is it true that he was cut up? That somehow spread, and nobody wants to own up to it.

It struck me that for as long as there was a likelihood that somebody would be prosecuted for it, we would never know or get closure. I was persuaded on those grounds that it was time to shift from the way we were behaving—the way we were dragging soldiers through inquiries and into the courts. As Soldier F even now tells us, it is unlikely that we will achieve what everyone here keeps talking about as justice. What we will achieve is a permanent state of anxiety and nobody getting justice in the course of it. It struck me that the only thing we could do was to get to the root of the problems, have those cases explained and get those who were involved in them to tell the families what happened and why. Therefore, they would at least have closure through having knowledge and understanding of why these things took place.

I wish we knew where Robert Nairac lies, if he lies anywhere at all. I wish his family knew. Many other soldiers and civilians are in those circumstances too. The terrorism and brutality of the IRA was appalling, yet we are still arguing about it even today.

Let me take us back about a month to Norman Tebbit’s funeral. I remember when he watched the person who set the bomb and blew up the Grand in Brighton walk free. I remember him saying to me afterwards, “It was the worst moment in my life—I went through all of this and I had injuries. This man went free because we had to get peace in Northern Ireland, but my wife will never be free, because she is immobilised for the rest of her life, and I have to live with that with her. We are both trapped in what happened in those seconds in the bombing.” For his sake and for everything else, he recognised finally, as horrible as it was, that there was a necessary compromise to be made.

Let me simply say that the attacks on the previous legislation forget that it was about trying to get truth and reconciliation, and about learning from other countries such as South Africa. As difficult and problematic as this issue is, there are major faults in this legislation, and I hope that the Secretary of State will respect the fact that amendments will be made and that he will accept many of them.

Northern Ireland Troubles Bill (Carry-over)

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Carry-over motion
Monday 27th April 2026 Commons Chamber

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

In the limited time I have, I say to the Secretary of State that this Bill was bad, and it is now a mess. He comes in front of the House to ask for a carry-over when he knows that carry-over motions are only ever to be used for Bills that are pretty well set, but have run out of time to progress. Such motions are not for highly contentious legislation that is about to be changed, possibly beyond recognition from what has gone before. He is now apparently addressing many of the issues, but we are not allowed to know, because they are a secret until next time, when we will come back to carry on with a massively changed Bill. It is bad procedure, and it is bad government. I say to the right hon. Gentleman, for whom I have a lot of time—he knows that—that this is just a bad route to take.

The problem that the Government have had from the beginning is that they have been tied up with trying to satisfy Sinn Féin and the hand of Ireland. I worry desperately about the arrangements. As the right hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson) said, where are the promises on delivery from Ireland? For all these years, there has been all the stuff that they know about who did what, when they did it and how it was done. All that has been kept behind closed doors for so long, and the Irish Government could have dealt with it earlier. Instead, there are people who do not want this to be open and we are now singing to their tune. That is what really bothers me.

We are now being asked to take a pitch in the dark. Having denied all the way through the Bill’s passage that veterans would be pursued vexatiously through the courts and having said that there were controls in place, the Government have apparently finally realised that that was not the case. All of a sudden, the position has changed.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

On the question of the failure of the Government of the Republic, the reality is that they have an outstanding interstate case against us.

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith]

It is astonishing. My right hon. Friend is exactly right. I served early on in Northern Ireland, and I lost a very good friend—I apologise for repeating his name—in Robert Nairac. We have never got to the bottom of what happened to him.

I thought that the speech from the hon. Member for Foyle (Colum Eastwood) was incredibly interesting. It is very difficult to pursue truth, which is why I supported the previous legislation. That was not because I thought it was a great Bill, but because I wanted some truth to come out. I do not think the vexatious pursuit of veterans will ever produce the truth that he rightly seeks. There is a better way, and it is not this Bill.

[Colum Eastwood]

Will the right hon. Member give way?

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith]

I will, but briefly, because I do not get any extra time.

[Colum Eastwood]

I am grateful to the right hon. Member. I understand his point, and a point was made earlier about the commission for the retrieval of remains. Basically, IRA members who were involved in the disappearance of people were given immunity within the confines of giving information. The bottom line is that it did not work. Jean McConville was found by a passer-by. Columba McVeigh has still not been found and others have not been found. The IRA did not give the information, even once it was given immunity. Immunity does not work, and it has been proven not to work.

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith]

We will not altogether agree about this issue. We can debate what actually happened, but we will never know, because the Government refused to pursue this matter through the courts. South Africa was a good example of how it could be done. I went out to advise in South Africa at the time, and I genuinely believe that the truth and reconciliation committee got to the bottom of quite a lot of what happened in South Africa and allowed some mending of fences. We will no doubt debate that issue further. I have high respect for the hon. Gentleman, and I understand his position.

In conclusion, we are being asked to vote blind on a Bill that we knew was damaged before. All our protestations about the vexatious pursuit of veterans were denied, as were all the issues that the right hon. Member for Belfast East has raised throughout the whole of this debate. The legislation was rather arrogantly pushed through, and the Government said, “No, you don’t know what you’re talking about. The legislation is perfectly okay.” At the last moment, when they have failed to get the Bill through, they have produced this idea that somehow there are amazing new amendments that will protect veterans going forward. Why should veterans, who have been vexatiously pursued endlessly for no particular reason, other than because they were veterans who served in Northern Ireland, now say, “Oh, that’s okay; it’d be a good idea to see what comes next time around, because they were so honest this time around.”? The Government have failed to be honest about this from start to finish.

The Armed Forces Minister is not here for a reason—because he knows very well that he does not want to be sitting on the Front Bench when the Bill gets voted through to the future. [Interruption.] I say to all colleagues, it is time to call time on this piece of bad legislation and kick it into the gutter.