High Court Judgment (John Downey)

Debate between Mark Durkan and Shaun Woodward

Thursday 27th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Woodward]

It is always dangerous to extrapolate from one person’s words and somebody else’s conclusion. One talks about “an interest”, but the hon. Lady’s refers to it as a “pressure”. All I can say to her is that, if there were questions from the Northern Ireland Office, as far as I am concerned, they could only ever be questions about facts. They could not in any way be about trying to interfere or change the outcome of any inquiry. The Secretary of State should know that, given the now legal status of the letters, the hon. Lady is entirely right to pose that question. It would be grossly misfortunate if the Justice were not to address that question. I remind the House that the situation is about an abuse of process, not just a letter. The entire process, of which the letter is a part, has been thrown up by the judgment.

That throws up the question of whether or not a status is conferred on the letters now—the letters were issued, as we thought, as statements of fact—that takes them beyond statements of fact. That is an issue of confidence. As the Secretary of State considers the debate—I expect her not to reply this afternoon, but to take away many of the considered comments made by right hon. and hon. Members—she should consider that the Downey judgment genuinely throws up the question whether or not letters issued in good faith by Ministers and the Northern Ireland Office as statements of fact are now more than statements of fact. If that is the case, the House deserves to know. It will be very difficult to rebuild confidence, which has been damaged across the process, without answering that question.

I am conscious of the time and do not wish to prevent other hon. Members from speaking. At the end of Justice Hallett’s review, we will have answers to some questions but not all. What will remain are questions of how we deal with some remaining dimensions of the past. The hon. Member for Aldershot (Sir Gerald Howarth) rightly puts back on the table the issue of the soldiers who were named and effectively indicted through the Saville inquiry. For them, in their old age, terrible worries ensue. Nobody should be above justice and I would never argue that whoever may be involved should be above justice. However, the case throws the issue on to the table once again and the Secretary of State may wish to reconsider it. That does not mean dragging out the discredited 2005 Northern Ireland (Offences) Bill, but perhaps we are approaching a point at which it would be sensible to consider a process that allows us to deal quickly and effectively, but only if it is fair, with those individual cases that arise out of dealing with the past of the troubles in Northern Ireland. It is an intolerable situation for those paratroopers to face, as the hon. Member for Aldershot set out so eloquently. It is equally intolerable for those who were victims of the troubles. I am not remotely suggesting that we revive the discredited 2005 Bill, but we know that Northern Ireland needs to move out of the past—not in the sense of forgetting its past, but it needs to move out of the grip of the past where that part of the past is a millstone around its neck.

[Mark Durkan]

The right hon. Gentleman refers to the eloquence of the hon. Member for Aldershot. I would hope that in doing so he is not endorsing the hon. Member for Aldershot’s description of the events of Bloody Sunday as mistakes in the heat of the battle.

[Mr Woodward]

Not for one moment. The hon. Member for Aldershot was kind and generous enough to say that when I was Secretary of State I always tried to deal with all these issues with impartiality. That does not mean to say that I do not think it is quite proper for right hon. and hon. Members eloquently to make cases on behalf of those they wish to represent. Whatever view Members may have, the House would have to recognise the distinction with which the hon. Gentleman has represented the case of those who were, of course, serving British interests by being soldiers in Northern Ireland at the time. That is not in any way to be a judgment by me on whether they acted in one area or another, appropriately, rightly or wrongly, but it is none the less to recognise the role they played.

I very much hope that the House will find time to debate Justice Hallett’s review when it happens. Perhaps the Secretary of State will confirm that the Government will give Government time for a full day’s debate on that review, because I think it is essential to rebuild the confidence that has been damaged by the errors that were made by the PSNI. It is crucial that the Government are able to re-establish confidence, and that this administrative process to deal with people finding out whether they were wanted or not wanted is restored to its credibility as an administrative scheme, and not some back-handed way of dealing with them in a special high-handed way.