Letter: Labour - scrap the ICRIR now and establish an acceptable, independent, victim-focused truth recovery Legacy Commission
A letter from George Larmour:
The dictionary definition of the word ‘repeal’ is ‘to revoke or annul an act of parliament’.
‘Revoke’ means ‘to officially cancel a decree, decision or promise’.
For clarity, ‘annul’ means ‘declared invalid – no longer to have had legal existence’.
When politicians make promises, especially when looking for votes, we have learned that they usually resort to words of political ambiguity to change what they meant.
The Labour government did just that when elected. They did not repeal the Conservative government’s Troubles Legacy Bill as promised. Instead, they tweaked it and essentially kept it in place apart from the repugnant amnesty bit.
Prime minister Keir Starmer and secretary of state Hilary Benn compounded that false promise U-turn insult by essentially confirming that there is a hierarchy of Troubles victims when they granted a public enquiry into the killing of Pat Finucane.
Every victim’s family deserves the same treatment, but all the other victims are only deemed worthy of being relegated to the second tier Independent Commission on Reconciliation and Information Recovery (ICRIR) status of victimhood treatment. This is disgraceful. The ICRIR is not the answer, Mr Benn. Stop kicking the Troubles legacy can of worms down the long road, prime minister. Have the decency to treat victims with the respect they deserve and honour your promise.
During the past 36 years of searching for the truth behind my brother John’s murder I have been let down by numerous chief constables, the Historical Enquiries Team (HET) and the Ombudsman Michael Maguire. None told me the truth.
The one person who made me a promise and kept it was Jon Boutcher and his Kenova team.
From our first visit over three years ago he spent time genuinely listening to my concerns. He met with me regularly, he answered all my questions truthfully.
When he didn’t know an answer, he went and searched for it. He provided me with the truth and treated me with the respect that all victims deserve – a man of integrity who understood victims and cared.
My message to Mr Starmer and Mr Benn is simple. Fulfil your promise. Scrap the ICRIR now and establish an acceptable, independent, victim-focused truth recovery Legacy Commission using the proven Kenova model or consign this place to a festering victims’ wound that will never heal and will never achieve meaningful reconciliation.
George Larmour, author ‘They killed the ice cream man,' Belfast BT13