Letter: Labour government has an opportunity to address legacy failures and provide an equal and fair system to all victims
A letter from Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard:
The Ulster Unionist Party is aware that although legacy matters have been a significant agenda item for governments and local political parties for many years, it is clear there is no agreement on how to take the process forward.
We were very clear in the run-up to the previous government’s legacy legislation that we were not supportive of the provision of immunity from prosecution for those who had caused some of the most heinous crimes in our society, including murder.
The new Labour government appears set on further bad decision-making by reopening legacy inquests and the hugely expensive and often ineffective public inquiries.
They have already announced one such inquiry, into the murder of alleged IRA member Pat Finucane.
The Independent Commission on Reconciliation and Information Recovery (ICRIR) has the potential to assist victims’ families in getting to the truth of what happened to their loved one, particularly with the option of new investigations.
It is vital however that every victim's family has the same opportunity and that there is not a hierarchy of victims who can get access to legacy inquests or public inquiries and also the ICRIR - all should have equality of process. Therefore, there should just be a single procedure - currently that is the ICRIR.
However, if the current government makes widespread changes to that body it could lose support from many within the victims’ sector and political representatives as well.
Labour governments have not been of significant help to the victims in the past, whereby they didn’t manage the total decommissioning of terrorist organisations' weapons, they provided letters of immunity to former terrorists, and they turned a blind eye to IRA criminality, including murder.
They now have an opportunity to go some way to address those afflictions that they foisted on the innocent victim's community by providing an equal and fair system to all victims and not providing additional opportunities to some above others.
Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard, Ulster Unionist peer