John Lamont
Main Page: John Lamont (Conservative - Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk)Department Debates - View all John Lamont's debates with the Northern Ireland Office
(1 day, 16 hours ago)
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Matthew Patrick
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his warm words. I will meet Executive Ministers in Northern Ireland next week to discuss this and other matters. I will ensure that we remove any blockages that we can, and that we do so by working together.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
Gregory Stafford (Farnham and Bordon) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Hilary Benn)
The Government are committed to repealing and replacing the legacy Act with new arrangements that seek to command greater confidence in Northern Ireland. Yesterday we published the Northern Ireland Troubles Bill and a draft remedial order to do just that.
John Lamont
Yesterday the Secretary of State announced this Labour Government’s new Northern Ireland Troubles Bill. Despite all the justifications for the Bill, it still means one thing: veterans, many of whom are elderly, being dragged back through the courts. Does the Secretary of State think that is an acceptable way to treat those people who bravely served and defended our country?
Hilary Benn
The hon. Gentleman says “dragged back” to court. The only circumstances in which a veteran, or anyone else, appears in court is if they are charged with an offence. He will know perfectly well what the figures show about prosecutions in the 27 years since the Good Friday agreement. Here we are talking about coroners’ inquests. A small number will be restarted because they were already in train and were stopped by the last legacy Act. The rest will go into the sifting process governed by the Solicitor General. We think that we have a fair and reasonable framework that we will put in place to ensure that veterans are protected and properly looked after.