Cillian McGrattan: Unionist collective memory is being sidelined by a nationalist view of the Troubles
Labour is expunging unionism and unionist-sensitive voices from the processes of governance while conducting an inquiry about ‘reconciliation’.
This is one of the findings the Malone House Group (MHG) put to the government in our submission to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee’s (NIAC) inquiry on reconciliation, which was published this month.
The NIAC is part of the governmental apparatus that scrutinises and advises the secretary of state on policy development.
Our report noted that nationalist voices and anti-unionist groups have predominated legacy hearings in London.
Thus, the Pat Finucane Centre (PFC) and the Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ) have been frequent guests before the NIAC.
As I pointed out in the News Letter in May, an anti-unionist, anti-state network, has been pushing a broadly pro-nationalist agenda on legacy for years. A 2025 job advert for the CAJ asked for a solicitor to ‘pursue non-legal strategic interventions in the [area] of legacy’ and who would run a ‘Legacy Practitioners Group with NGOs (including Amnesty NI, the Pat Finucane Centre, Relatives for Justice …), lawyers and academics to coordinate sectoral interventions and advocacy’.
Interestingly, the Northern Ireland Office itself seemingly recognises that these groups fall under the same umbrella: The secretary of state’s diary for the first quarter of the year reveals that Hilary Benn met with the CAJ, Amnesty, the PFC, and Relatives for Justice as a collective at the end of February to discuss legacy policy.
He never met with MHG. His engagement with unionist-sensitive groups was minimal.
The anti-unionist bias is even more blatant in Dublin. Since October 2017 (and the beginning of the 31st Dáil), the Republic’s joint committee on Northern Ireland has heard from CAJ five times, PFC and its southern sister group, Justice for the Forgotten, four times, Sinn Féin and the republican terrorist prisoner’s group Coiste four times, RFJ, three times, Amnesty once and WAVE Trauma Centre four times.
Given that WAVE does not draw a distinction between terrorist and anti-state victims on the one hand and innocent victims on the other, it cannot be said to be inclusive of unionist viewpoints.
Indeed, its support of an all-inclusive definition of victimhood works, I would argue, against good practice and ethics of differentiating between victims and perpetrators.
The problem with all of this is not simply moral or democratic; it does not make sense to design a policy based on the exclusion of unionism and non-republicans.
This also has a legal basis: MHG has argued that legacy policy is out of balance and its focus on anti-state litigation has demonstrably failed – an assessment in line with the Supreme Court’s recent rejection of countervailing voices in the Dillon judgment.
One way to restore balance would be to restrict the use of legal aid to law firms who can demonstrate parity of esteem when it comes to their non-single-identity work.
In other words, if firms who are fighting cases mainly from one side of the community or from one ideological (anti-state and anti-unionist) position, then they would have to show a balance in their work to become applicable for legal aid.
This is a position for Naomi Long as justice minister to operationalise and would fit precisely within Alliance’s anti-sectarian ideology.
MHG has argued that litigation can be an impediment to reconciliation and ought to be wound down immediately.
Given the biases in London, the NIO and Dublin in favour of anti-unionist and anti-state lobbying it is unlikely that those types of proposals will even be heard.
Unionist collective memory isn’t being erased, it’s being reframed; it’s being expunged not erased.
The WAVE and Labour approach of welcoming everyone undercuts that memory. It places republican terrorists on the same level as innocent victims.
l Dr Cillian McGrattan is a member of the Malone House Group