Northern Ireland: Legacy of the Past

Leigh Ingham Excerpts

Thursday 19th March 2026 Westminster Hall

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

I would like to start by referring to the intervention of the hon. Member for Belfast South and Mid Down (Claire Hanna), who is sadly no longer in her place. She talked about people stepping forward and speaking the truth. I believe that the Government’s new approach makes that less, rather than more, likely to happen. In their response to the Select Committee report, the Government speak in disparaging terms about the immunity provisions that the previous Conservative Government laid down; those immunity provisions are described as an affront to democracy. I do not believe that is true at all. It is not true any more than claiming that what happened in South Africa, when Nelson Mandela sought to heal that society, was an affront to their new democracy.

[Leigh Ingham (Stafford) (Lab)]

Will the right hon. Member give way?

[Sir Julian Lewis]

I would like to make a little progress first, then I certainly will. I chaired the Defence Committee when we produced a report that recommended the combination of a statute of limitation with a truth recovery process as the best way to proceed. That report took evidence, as I have mentioned many times, from four eminent professors of law. They pointed out that that recommendation was a perfectly legal way to proceed, provided that, if immunities were introduced, they would be brought in for everybody, and provided that the matters concerned would be properly investigated. That investigation could consist of a truth recovery process; it did not have to involve prosecuting people after the investigations had taken place. Some of us have been very concerned about the malicious and vexatious prosecution of service personnel.

If the idea is, on the one hand, to rule out the vexatious pursuit of service personnel and, on the other hand, to heal society by allowing people who suffered in the troubles to find out the truth, then the package of a statute of limitation coupled with a truth recovery process seemed ideal. I cannot quite understand why the Government, and those who support their approach of reopening all those investigations, seem to think that their approach will lead to effective truth recovery. How much more likely is it that people will come forward and tell the truth when they know that they could be incriminating themselves because the Government have reopened that lethal can of worms? That compares with a situation inherent in the original package: by giving everybody immunity, people could then come forward and tell the truth without any fear of adverse consequences to themselves.

The other objection that is made, which I see spelled out explicitly in the Government’s response to the report, is that it is insulting to put everybody on the same level—that it is putting terrorists, service personnel and security forces on the same level. I have pointed out on countless occasions—and never heard a convincing refutation of this—that that ship has already sailed. The Northern Ireland (Sentences) Act 1998 laid down that if anyone is convicted, even of the most appalling atrocities—murders, tortures, rape, you name it—in relation to the troubles, they will not actually serve more than two years in jail. Why does it say that for everyone? Because the law has to be impartial. Just because the law applies impartially to service personnel and terrorists alike does not mean that it draws a moral equivalence between them, and neither did the package here. Its purpose was to give immunity to stop vexatious prosecutions and to enable the truth recovery process to allow the victims to find out what had happened.

A third point that has been put forward is: “Well, they want justice.” But in order to get justice, there has to be a realistic prospect of securing convictions. Even in the case of Bloody Sunday, where we would have thought there was the maximum chance of securing convictions, no conviction was secured. So why do people want to reopen all the prosecutions of service personnel? The answer is that it is not because they expect to get convictions, but because they want to rewrite history and put service personnel through the trauma of being tried, investigated and pursued, even though it is overwhelmingly unlikely that they will be convicted of anything. As has been said before, and deserves to be said again, the punishment is the process, not the actual conviction at the end of that process, which would not be obtained.

I appreciate that the Government have a mandate to try this approach, and I have to respect that. I hope that they will be proven right, and that we on the Opposition Benches will be proven wrong, but somehow I do not think so. It does not help for the Government to insult those of us who tried genuinely to put forward a combination of measures that we were told was legal by four professors of law—a package with immunity for everyone on the one hand, and a truth recovery process to fulfil the obligation to investigate on the other. That package would have been far more likely to lead to reconciliation and the recovery of truth, and to avoid the vexatious pursuit of brave service and security personnel. The Government cannot say that they have not been warned.

--- Later in debate ---

[Fleur Anderson]

I absolutely agree, and my hon. Friend makes a very good point: this also includes service families. No matter what family someone comes from, it is a huge loss. These are people missing from family tables, about whom there are still questions, and it is a trauma not to know what happened—that is what this legacy legislation aims to resolve. We are so many years on, and there is so much investigating yet to do. I understand that many people simply want to know how their loved ones died.

The ICRIR is taking forward 100 investigations, some of which Peter Sheridan listed in his evidence to the Committee. Those include the deaths of Alexander Millar in 1975; Seamus Bradley, a 19-year-old; Rory O’Kelly in 1977; Kathleen O’Hagan in August 1994, who was seven months’ pregnant, and her baby also died in that attack; James and Ellen Sefton in 1990; and Judge Rory Conaghan in 1974. Those are just some of the people who died—their families have questions, and they are being investigated by the ICRIR.

The commission’s caseload also includes the 1974 Guildford pub bombings, the 1974 M62 coach bombing, the 1976 Kingsmill massacre, and the 1979 Warrenpoint massacre, which was the deadliest attack on British forces during the troubles. We must ensure that those investigations can progress and deliver answers for families, and that all communities can have confidence in the commission, as trust was also a key element of the evidence given in the report.

The last Government’s legacy Act had no support in Northern Ireland, and it is clear why that was the case. It shut down the right of individuals to pursue a civil case, whether against the state or perpetrators of terrorism. It cruelly stopped a number of inquests midway through, and it ended over 1,000 police investigations in Northern Ireland and England, including those into the deaths of more than 200 UK service personnel, as my hon. Friend the Member for Halesowen (Alex Ballinger) highlighted.

The Act was also widely opposed in Northern Ireland by political parties and victims and families. In November 2025, Sandra Peake—the chief executive of the WAVE Trauma Centre—wrote to all MPs, and she also gave very powerful evidence to the Committee for the report. In her letter to MPs, Sandra said:

“The then Government wanted to draw a veil over the past but there isn’t a veil thick enough to hide the blood and bones of murdered loved ones or to muffle the cries of their families.”

The arbitrary ending of troubles-related inquests, and closing the civil action route to justice, confirmed the belief that the interests of victims were not only not on the agenda, but had not even made it into “Any other business”.

[Leigh Ingham]

I, too, met victims at the WAVE centre when I was on the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee. When I read the letter that my hon. Friend just mentioned, this comment really resonated with me:

“Whatever the then Government’s intention, the result would have been that terrorists who carried out the most egregious crimes imaginable would be able to walk free if they told their story”.

They felt like that was too much, so does my hon. Friend agree that the Government are right to address this issue for victims who have come forward?

[Fleur Anderson]

I absolutely agree; it was just too much even to ask or encourage more people to come forward—if they did come forward, there would be no justice. The families of victims often see those people in their local supermarket; they are living in their communities, but the families know that there is no hope of them ever having justice. That is too painful to contemplate.

Like the report, I welcome the fact that the Government have taken a very different approach. I know that the Secretary of State engaged widely on the drafting of the Bill with victims’ groups, families, veterans and other affected parties, and I was pleased to play a part in those discussions. The troubles Bill will restore civil cases and enable the resumption of halted inquests. It will mean that legacy cases are dealt with sensitively and efficiently through a reformed legacy commission, with the fullest possible disclosure of information to families. Rather than making false promises to our veterans, as the legacy Act did, the Bill will put in place six genuine protections for any veteran who is asked to give information, and nobody who carried out acts of terrorism will be given immunity.

We should be clear that it was terrorists—the IRA, the Ulster Volunteer Force, the Irish National Liberation Army and the Ulster Defence Association—who were responsible for the vast majority of deaths during the troubles. It is right that where there is evidence of criminality by anyone, those responsible should be held to account. Frankly, it is shocking that many Opposition Members disagree and would prefer to grant immunity to those who carried out the most heinous acts of terrorism on UK soil.

The Government agreed information-sharing commitments with the Irish authorities under the joint framework announced in September. I welcome the fact that the Select Committee visited Ireland before and during the compilation of the report. The agreement is unprecedented and could be hugely significant in enabling answers to be found for families once the new legacy commission is established.

I am glad that the report highlights the powers of the Secretary of State, the definition of a family member, and the need to listen to victims, listen again and keep listening. These are people who have lost trust in the system. Slowly but surely—through the Government’s actions and the actions of organisations such as the South East Fermanagh Foundation, WAVE and so many others working in mental health across Northern Ireland—the trust of families has been built up. But they will need to see good outcomes.

I welcome the increased funding for the commission and the PSNI, and the reiteration of the need for speed in this work. As has been pointed out many times, many of the family members are now elderly. They are seeing out the end of their days and just want the answers they seek in time.