Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill

Katherine Fletcher Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 24th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Peter Kyle]

I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman for correcting the record. Three thousand and more lost their lives in the troubles, and I apologise to the House for getting a zero in the wrong place.

The Belfast/Good Friday agreement sets out that

“we must never forget those that have died or been injured and their families”.

In truth, though, victims and their families were left without a clear path to address their personal tragedies through the peace process. The Good Friday agreement was a staggering achievement, but is ambiguous as to how to eventually address the killings committed during the troubles. While this was necessary to reach an agreement to end the conflict, it left victims’ families wanting. In 2015, following years of failings, the five main political parties in Northern Ireland and the UK and Irish Governments signed the Stormont House agreement. The result of months of painstaking negotiations, it provided a comprehensive way forward on dealing with the past. Its centrepiece was the establishment of an independent Historical Investigations Unit, with full policing powers to work through, in chronological order, outstanding troubles-related cases, and a separate independent commission on information retrieval. Despite Stormont securing the support of all elected parties at the time in Northern Ireland, regrettably this Bill jettisons that approach.

Northern Ireland deserves to look forward to a bright future, rather than living in the shadow of its past. That can only happen when those who have lost loved ones no longer have to spend countless hours searching for answers. The UK Government have a critical role to play in building a brighter future by building trust and acting as an honest broker to find a way forward.

Unfortunately, the Bill does not provide victims’ families with a process they can trust. In fact, it deepens their pain and trauma. Its provisions would set up a new body, the independent commission for reconciliation and information recovery, to provide answers to families about what happened to their loved ones during the troubles. All criminal investigations, all inquests that are not at the very advanced stage and all civil actions would cease and be folded into the new body.

The Government argue that, due to the passage of time, we have a duty to empower that body to grant immunity to killers in return for information they have about their actions. There is still the possibility of prosecution for those who fail to provide an account of their actions to the commission, but the bar for immunity is set so low that it is hard to see prosecutions happening in practice. The commission must grant immunity if three conditions are met: the perpetrator requests immunity, they then give an account to the body that is true to the best of their knowledge and belief, and the conduct they describe would otherwise have exposed them to criminal investigation or prosecution.

I must be blunt. Such a low bar for attaining immunity is offensive to the families who have lost loved ones and, in many cases, waited decades for answers. I will illustrate that concern with an example. Raymond McCord was murdered by loyalist paramilitaries in November 1997. His father joins us today in the Public Gallery. There was no coroner’s inquest into Raymond’s murder, no police investigation that involved or reported to his family and no public inquiry. Raymond Sr. went through two court cases to have information regarding his son’s death released. He won, but when he received all the information, he found out that of 303 pages, 296 were redacted. At the same time, his son’s gravestone has been repeatedly vandalised, an action clearly intended to deepen the pain felt by his family.

Across the House, we must consider today whether this Bill offers Raymond’s family as many new rights as it does his murderer. I do not believe it does. Under this legislation, Raymond’s murderer has the right to come forward and, should he tell a basic but realistic account of his crime, he must be given immunity from prosecution—an immunity that stands even if in future that account is proved to be false. He could even go on to write a book about it, and wave at the victims’ families in the street as they pass.

Those are the rights given to Raymond’s murderer, yet nothing in the Bill says that the independent commission must listen to victims, communicate with them or take measures to protect their dignity and health. Those seem pretty basic rights to me, but even that low threshold is not met. The situation I have outlined is not hypothetical. These are real fears that are frequently felt by victims and that cause crippling anxiety. We must be on their side.

Just as disturbingly, the Bill does not prohibit anyone who has committed or covered up acts of sexual violence during the conflict from seeking immunity. Máiría Cahill, who was the victim of years of sexual abuse at the hands of the IRA, has said:

“This bill is, quite simply, disgraceful. Government say they take sexual violence seriously. Yet they are prepared to grant amnesty to those accused of conflict related sexual offences either in NI or England. It is an affront to victims, to justice and is gross hypocrisy.”

Let us be clear what we are talking about here. This Bill could well lead to someone who has committed rape being given immunity from prosecution. None of us can even imagine the impact that such a thing would have on the victim.

I will return to that theme but, before I do, I will talk about how the Government have approached the Bill in the wider sense—namely, the staggering lack of consultation and care given to this incredibly sensitive issue in the way this new Bill was conceived, drafted and is now being legislated. For reference, in 2018 the Government ran a public consultation on the previous legacy proposals, which ran for 21 weeks and received 17,000 responses. That was the right way to handle the issue.

I agree with the words of this Government in 2018:

“In order to build consensus on workable proposals that have widespread support we must listen to the concerns of victims, survivors and other interested parties.”

In comparison, the process for this Bill, with its unprecedented policy of granting immunity for murder and serious violence, has lacked any meaningful consultation at all. The Government published the Bill a mere seven days ago. It is 90 pages long and, in the words of one victims’ group, “heavily legal”. Yet, regrettably, the Northern Ireland Office refused to give detailed briefings to victims’ groups until today’s debate. That has caused not only hurt but confusion about what the Bill is offering. It damages rather than builds trust.

There seems to be a dismissive attitude towards prelegislative scrutiny of the Bill. Let us take the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, which was set up by the Belfast/Good Friday agreement specifically to safeguard rights in Northern Ireland. Its advice on the Bill was not asked for, and yesterday it announced that it appears incompatible with our human rights commitments. It read the Bill at the same time last week that the rest of us did. Had it been consulted before—that is, after all, part of the purpose for which it was founded—the Bill could have avoided some of the stinging criticism it is currently receiving.

Similarly, the Bill will have material consequences for the Police Service of Northern Ireland and the judiciary. Both currently manage legacy cases, yet neither seems to have been given advance notice that the Government were planning to strip them of their role with almost immediate effect. The Irish Government, our partners in the peace process and co-signatories to the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, did not see the Bill until it was published. They have now said they cannot support it in its current form.

With the greatest of respect to the Secretary of State, consistent polling has shown that the UK Government are now the least trusted actor in Northern Ireland. Rushing these proposals into Parliament here in Westminster has already damaged the reconciliation we are all aiming for. I understand that the Secretary of State is trying his best to find a way forward, but any proposal to deal with legacy must have victims and communities in Northern Ireland at its heart.

[Katherine Fletcher (South Ribble) (Con)]

I want to build on the point my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) made earlier. The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission dealt with many such concerns and fears; I used to live in the country and I have heard first-hand testimony from people who participated in it. What struck me as incredibly important in that set-up was the leadership and sponsorship of some of the greats such as Mandela, Tutu and other members of the community. I have listened carefully to what the shadow Secretary of State is saying and it feels very down in the detail, but can he encourage leaders in the different communities to give the Bill that sponsorship to get people to give it a chance? The truth is a nebulous as well as a legal concept.

[Peter Kyle]

I am grateful for the intervention. I have some understanding of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission; I was studying for my doctorate in South Africa while it was running and I followed it very closely.

The figures who the hon. Lady mentioned were not just involved in running the commission; they were all also involved in conceiving it. The figures who lead communities in Northern Ireland—some in the House today, some not—were not involved in this Bill or consulted for it. The only process that did that was the Stormont House agreement, which has been jettisoned by the current approach. Sadly, the key learnings from it have not made it into the current Bill.

I understand the point that the hon. Lady is making about moral and political leadership. In South Africa, there was a huge, concerted effort to bring forward support from all communities, but what we are discussing is coming from Westminster into Northern Ireland. The provisions should be birthed in Northern Ireland and come through to Westminster.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Katherine Fletcher Excerpts

Monday 21st September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)]

It is a pleasure, as always, to follow the right hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson). He may well have gone over his five minutes, but every word was well worth listening to. I will make sure that I stick to five minutes.

I had the pleasure and honour of chairing the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee for seven years, and our first report was to encourage the Government to explore ways in which corporation tax in Northern Ireland could be reduced to the levels in the Republic so that Northern Ireland businesses could compete on a level playing field. We were told by the European Union that it would be against its rules to do that: it had to be devolved and the Northern Ireland Assembly had to do it, and even then it would be very restricted when it tried to do it. Such taxation, which normally we would claim as our responsibility in this place, comes under the state aid rules. When we talk about bringing powers over state aid back to this Parliament, we are not necessarily talking about bailing out lame ducks. I am showing my age when I mention that phrase; I think it was first used in the early 1970s. We are not even just talking about giving boosts to certain parts of the economy. We are actually, in some cases, talking about the control of taxation. We are all familiar with the phrase, “No taxation without representation.” It is very important, therefore, that the Government stand firm on this issue.

When I was working to prepare the Committee’s report, I said that it was very important to cement the relative peace that had been achieved in Northern Ireland by having a sound economy. Obviously one of the best ways to achieve a sound economy is through trade. It is therefore very important that we do everything we can to protect trade in the United Kingdom, and, as far as I can make out, that is exactly what this Bill is trying to do. It not only connects the four countries of the United Kingdom and paves the way for them to continue to trade with each other very easily; it also makes sure that Northern Ireland can trade, as the right hon. Member for East Antrim said, with its largest trading partner, and that is Great Britain. As I said on Second Reading, north-south trade is very important, but it is not as valuable as east-west trade or west-east trade. That is something we have to be determined to protect.

I do not anticipate the European Union working from a position of bad faith. I am sure that it will continue to do everything it can to protect its businesses by coming to a free trade agreement with the United Kingdom. If we achieve that, none of what we are discussing tonight becomes important. In case it does not act in good faith, however, we need an insurance policy so that we can cement the relative peace in Northern Ireland through prosperity and continue to secure the Union of the United Kingdom.

[Katherine Fletcher (South Ribble) (Con)]

I intend to keep my remarks short to aid the House’s consideration of such an important topic. I am a proud child of the north-west of England and I am sure the House agrees that there are strong links between the communities of Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland and those in Manchester, Liverpool, Lancashire and beyond. We travel, live and work on both sides of the short straits of the Irish sea, as my hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Antony Higginbotham) said.

It will shock several hon. Members that I am actually really old—old enough to remember the shock of seeing my home town of Manchester shattered by an explosion and the devastation of the Warrington bomb. From the ’90s onwards, I have been proud to have good friends on different sides of the Northern Irish community who studied, lived and worked here and in the north-west, and who are now successful business women trading on both sides of the Irish sea. That is not to forget my next-door neighbour.

Those wonderful women and men told me stories of their childhoods. They were often a difficult and heart-rending listen, but they are important for today’s debate. They were of losing a parent to a car bomb, of having two different ways to say house to avoid the beating that would undoubtedly come if they identified their community by their pronunciation, and of the fear that they would not be able to go home if peace was not secured. To the many hon. Members who have proposed that the Bill poses a threat to the hard-won peace and that the Government would consciously do something to bring about such awful events and bring them back, I say an emphatic no.

As a young woman, I listened to teenage girls crying in a pub about what had happened to them and their families. I promised myself that if I were ever in a position to have influence, “never again” would be my mantra. To keep that promise to my teenage self, I have examined in detail the measures in the Bill and studied the text of the Good Friday agreement, specifically the section on economic, social and cultural issues, which includes:

“the British Government will pursue broad policies for sustained economic growth and stability in Northern Ireland and for promoting social inclusion, including in particular community development and the advancement of women in public life.”

The Bill in no way undermines the Good Friday agreement. On the contrary, it includes provisions to protect the agreement and help to ensure that, regardless of whether further agreement is reached in negotiations with the EU, there will be no hard border between Northern Ireland and Great Britain, and Northern Ireland businesses will continue to benefit from unrestricted access to the rest of the UK market when the transition period ends.

We need the ability to pursue, as it says in the Good Friday agreement, broad policies for sustained economic growth. My reading of the WA requires us to issue specific clarifications encoded in the Bill. The Government are taking reasonable steps to create a safety net that ensures that they are always able to deliver on their commitments to the people of Northern Ireland and uphold the gains of the peace process. To be specific, we cannot have a situation where goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland face restrictions from a third party and where we cannot help to pursue community development due to EU regulations.

I am confident that the Government’s commitment to the Good Friday agreement is beyond question, but I appeal to EU and UK leadership to redouble their efforts in negotiations to reach an agreement and render the safety net not required.

I thank the Government for amendment 66 and for giving the House an ability to have its say should that eventuality even come close to coming to pass.

I will vote with the Government on the Bill today and I will keep my word to those old friends of mine who owned the white Vectra, enjoyed a good DJ set and to whom my drink will always remain a Guinness. They are all powerful businesswomen—I will support them and I will support the Bill.