Northern Ireland: Haass Talks

Lord Eames Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Eames (CB)]

My Lords, we frequently hear the phrase that is the headline for this debate: “dealing with the past”. But less frequently do we consider what those words mean. Thirty years of conflict, 3,500 deaths, family life subjected to unbelievable stress, victimhood inflicted on thousands, and memories of loved ones injured and scarred for life, both in uniform and out of it. I speak after more than 40 years of pastoral work in Northern Ireland, 20 of them as Anglican archbishop. The recollection of numerous funerals and the attempts to support broken families will go with me to my grave.

When people talk about dealing with the past, it is much more than statistics that can be dismissed with the stroke of the political pen. It is about faces, voices, tears and frustration: little children deprived of parents. It is about people. Many of those people today ask for justice for themselves or for a loved one. Three thousand unsolved deaths remain to be addressed. They ask for justice, but justice comes in many forms: someone standing in the dock, someone taking responsibility, someone offering an apology—and some simply want to know what happened. I could quote many examples of each of those categories. Above all, they emphasise that foremost in any solution to the past must be the victims and the survivors.

The Consultative Group on the Past, of which I was privileged to be co-chairman, produced the suggestion of a legacy commission that would combine the elements of reconciliation, investigation and storytelling. It should last for five years and it should bring a form of closure to dealing with the past. We presented that blueprint more than five years ago. Whatever else was rejected in our report, the seeds of a legacy commission remain a talking point today, and indeed have surfaced in one form in the recent Haass proposals.

Northern Ireland is tired of political posturing and endless discredited proposals. Most of its people want to move on and live their lives. Today health, education and jobs are the real issues. However, until and unless there is the political will to deal with the past, our community will lurch from one disclosure, one media speculation and one blame game to another. I beg the Minister to take some of this frustration back to the Government, for I honestly believe that until there is some redress and the political will to address the issues of the tragic past, a lot else will fail.