Northern Ireland Troubles: Legacy and Reconciliation

Debate between Lincoln Jopp and Andy McDonald

Wednesday 21st January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough and Thornaby East) (Lab)]

I welcome the introduction of the remedial order. It is a necessary and overdue step if the Government are to retain the confidence of the people of Northern Ireland that they are serious about justice, accountability and dealing honestly with the legacy of the troubles.

As several hon. and gallant Members have said from the Government Benches, those who served never wanted special protection, exemptions or immunity from the law. They wanted and expected exactly what the public expect: to be judged by the same universal standards of justice that apply to everyone else. Accountability does not weaken the armed forces but strengthens trust in them.

The remedial order recognises that basic principle. It removes the conditional immunity and de facto amnesty contained in the 2023 legacy Act—provisions that were found unlawful by the courts in the Dillon case in Belfast. The High Court and the Court of Appeal were clear that those provisions breached articles 2 and 3 of the European convention on human rights and the Windsor framework. The Government accepted that judgment and rightly abandoned their appeal. Those immunity provisions never legally took effect, and it is right that they are now formally removed.

The order also restores access to civil claims, reopening an important route to truth and accountability that had been wrongly closed. These processes were never about witch hunts. Since the Good Friday agreement, only one former soldier has been convicted for a troubles-era killing, and he received a suspended sentence. That is not lawfare. What civil cases and inquests have done is to correct false records, expose wrongdoing and finally give families truthful answers after decades of official denial.

However, we must honest. The remedial order does not go far enough. Section 45 of the legacy Act, which blocks the Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland from investigating troubles-related police misconduct, remains unaddressed. The Court of Appeal found that to be incompatible with human rights, yet victims and families are still denied access to a fully independent investigative mechanism. That failure continues.

The Government are, of course, serious about a victim-centred approach to the past, and in pursuit of that further amendments are essential. National security must not be used as a smokescreen for secrecy. Families must have enforceable rights to truth, information and challenge, particularly when the Secretary of State retains wide powers over legacy bodies. That is especially important given the unresolved disagreements surrounding the Public Office (Accountability) Bill.

[Lincoln Jopp]

I am new in this place, but my sense of the hon. Member is that he a great parliamentarian, so I would like to understand how he has reconciled himself with this being the correct course for the Government to take—bringing in a remedial order that pulls a law out before we put a new one in?

[Andy McDonald]

I thank the hon. Member for that intervention. There is an obligation on the Government under section 4 of the Human Rights Act: where they have been told by a court that legislation is incompatible with a convention right, they are duty-bound to remove that incompatibility. That is exactly what is being done here. [Interruption.] The hon. Member chunters from a sedentary position, but that is the legal position.

The remedial order is a positive correction, but it is only a first step. Justice delayed has already cost families decades. Justice diluted will cost confidence altogether. If we want reconciliation rooted in truth, the law must apply equally to all, and independent investigations must be fully restored.

Employment Rights Bill

Debate between Lincoln Jopp and Andy McDonald

Consideration of Lords message
Wednesday 5th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Andy McDonald]

The concept is pretty simple. Conservative Members are conflating different issues around unfair dismissal and probationary contracts. They are scaremongering. There is nothing in the Bill that prevents the continuation of probation periods. The only thing we are saying is that it would be unfair to dismiss somebody for an unlawful reason. I really wonder why it is so difficult to grasp that concept.

[Lincoln Jopp]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Andy McDonald]

No, because I am conscious of time.

There is no impact on retaining probationary periods—they remain intact. Having day one rights against unfair dismissal does not prevent an employer vetting and doing recruitment properly, and using probationary periods legitimately.

Turning to Lords amendment 1B, the so-called guaranteed hours opt-out, this provision transforms a clear right into a conditional option. Instead of guaranteeing a contract that reflects the hours a person actually works, it allows employers to invite workers to opt out of that right altogether. Experience with the working time opt-out shows exactly where this leads: it becomes a standard clause, routinely signed away. That is not the end of exploitative zero-hours contracts; it is their re-badging.

Finally, Lords amendment 62, which reintroduces ballot thresholds for industrial action, seeks to restore one of the most restrictive elements of the Trade Union Act 2016. This House has already agreed that those provisions were excessive and undemocratic. No other organisation is bound by such turnout requirements before it may act. Reinstating them would frustrate meaningful negotiation and delay the resolution of disputes, not promote it. Let us drop the thresholds and quickly move to e-balloting, as we promised.

For those reasons, I urge hon. Members to resist the Lords amendments and to insist on the Bill as originally passed by this House. It must be delivered in full, for it represents the baseline of a fair work settlement. However, while defending the Bill, we must also recognise that it is only a starting point. The consultations now under way must ensure that secondary legislation goes further and fulfils the Government’s wider promise to make work pay. I hope we see a robust and enforceable right of access for trade unions to workplaces, both physical and digital, so that unions can reach and represent workers effectively, with penalties that deter obstruction. I hope we will create a process to expand fair pay agreements beyond adult social care and schools, embedding sectoral collective bargaining across the economy to raise pay and standards in every workplace. We must also make progress towards a single status of worker.

The Employment Rights Bill is a landmark measure, but its promise will be realised only if this House defends it against dilution and strengthens it in implementation. I therefore call on all Members to reject the Lords amendments and to stand by our commitment to working people: to deliver the new deal for working people in full and to build from it a fairer, more secure world of work.

Employment Rights Bill

Debate between Lincoln Jopp and Andy McDonald

Report stage
Wednesday 12th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Lincoln Jopp]

I think the hon. Lady has slightly missed the point of what I was saying. Reading the body language of Members on the Government Benches, I think they all wanted to hear how this story ended up.

It did help that the then Secretary of State for Defence was a friend of mine, with whom I served in the Scots Guards. We did get the £20 bung for all the service personnel who stood in—regardless of the fact, interestingly, that all the generals, air marshals and admirals were against it, as were all the officials. There you go—I very much have the same values at heart.

Secondly, to win over the other side of the House to the very fair point I will come on to make, let me pay tribute to the remark of the right hon. Member for Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North (Liam Byrne), in respect of union membership, that he wanted people to

“make a fair choice one way or the other”.

I note that the hon. Member for Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch (Katrina Murray) also referred to fair work. I want to come back to that theme of fairness in addressing amendment 292.

The Bill is, to put it politely, something of a cat’s cradle of clauses, so I will briefly remind the House that the Bill seeks to place on employers an obligation to give their workers a written statement that they have the right to join a union, and, if they do join, to contribute to the political fund. Amendment 292 would simply inject a bit of balance into the legislation by requiring trade unions to notify their members annually that they have a right to opt out of the political fund and to obtain an annual opt-in from their members.

This all puts me in mind of November 1988, when Mrs Thatcher was about to visit Poland. At Prime Minister’s questions, just prior to her going, an Opposition Member stood up and asked whether she would raise with Lech Wałęsa the right to join a trade union. There may be some Members present who were there—I will not be so ungallant as to ask. A roar went up from the Labour Benches, and the redoubtable Mrs Thatcher replied that she would raise with the Poles the right to join a trade union, but that she would also raise the right not to be a member.

The Bill seeks to whack the pendulum pretty hard in favour of union power; our amendment would bring it back into balance somewhat. We all know someone, after all, who has fallen prey to one of those charity muggers who stop people in the street and try to sign them up to whichever charity they are being paid by that day. I have known people who have done that job, and it is not an easy one. Similarly, any Member of this House who stood in a precinct and tried to sell their political brand and get people to sign up will attest to that completely. Sometimes, the charity collectors are successful, and the all-important direct debit details are extracted. In fact, I remember hearing a number of Labour Members railing against this practice in the previous Parliament.

Amendment 292 would remind workers that they still have an off-ramp, if they want one—they still have agency, and they still have freedom of choice. We have heard Member after Member stand up over the past two days of debate and declare—in some cases sheepishly, in some cases more proudly—the money they receive from the trade unions. This is only right and proper. The public can make up their own minds as to whether this money has coloured the judgment of Labour Members, or whether it is simply support from an organisation that shares their values. But to turn down amendment 292 would, in my view, be a dreadful look. This is a totally measured, balancing amendment and, if Labour Members vote against it, the public would be right to conclude that the Government are being motivated not by a sense of equality, fairness and justice, but instead by something else. I urge hon. Members to vote for amendment 292 and to give power to the people.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough and Thornaby East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to be called to speak for a second time on Report. I proudly refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests as a member of Unite the union.

Much has been said about trade unions and strike action, as if the only purpose of a trade union is to get workers out on strike. It is a mischaracterisation of unions, as was so eloquently described by my hon. Friend the Member for Tipton and Wednesbury (Antonia Bance). It is also a mischaracterisation of corporate Britain to think that everyone is exploitative and abusive. The majority of companies in our country adhere to environmental, social and governance principles, and they make that commitment; they want to demonstrate that they are responsible people. They want that for their investors and for long-term sustained investment, so we have to draw back on those views and step away from the disdain and the contempt for working people and for trade unions, which is not helpful.