Daughter bereaved by IRA calls for new peer Claire Fox to be ‘emphatic’ and ‘unequivocal’ in condemning all terror

Troubles campaigner Aileen Quinton said Claire Fox – or anyone in public life – must be “emphatic” in condemning all terror, past or present.

Last week the Conservative government appointed Ms Fox a member of the House of Lords. This was surprising, since she believes it should be abolished.

Ms Fox was elected in 2019 as an MEP for The Brexit Party.

But she had previously been a member of the now-defunct Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP).

Left-wing journalist George Monbiot described the RCP in the 1990s as an “obscure sect” and a “tiny group of cranks”.

The issue which Troubles victims particularly object to is the fact that, after the 1993 bombing of Warrington’s shopping district – which killed Johnathan Ball, 3, and Tim Parry, 12 – the RCP’s magazine declared: “Our response remains unchanged: we defend the right of the Irish people to take whatever measures are necessary in their struggle for freedom.”

There is no evidence Ms Fox directly wrote that phrase, but the declaration continues to make her association with the RCP controversial.

The matter was raised in the press last year when the Brexit Party selected Ms Fox as a candidate.

At that time, media reports say the Brexit Party issued a statement stating Ms Fox does “not support the IRA or its methods”.

She also reportedly said she had never knowingly had contact with any paramilitaries.

She added: “The 1994 IRA ceasefire and the 1998 Good Friday Agreement drew a line under the conflict.

“It is surely time to move on.

“The people of the north of Ireland voted for the Good Friday Agreement and I embrace the peace that it has made possible.

“All politics should be pursued by peaceful means.”

Ms Quinton, who was a Brexit Party candidate in London last year, and whose mother Alberta died in the Enniskillen bomb – told the News Letter yesterday: “It’s just another example of the acceptability of supporting terrorism, and the fact people are not even expected to give full and unequivocal condemnation even if they did hold views in the past.

“There’s been an awful fudge, this talking about ‘I support the Belfast Agreement’.

“Well, the IRA supposedly support the Belfast Agreement. But that doesn’t mean the IRA condemns its own terrorism.”

She imagines that the Tories “very superficially” read Ms Fox’s statement endorsing the Good Friday Agreement and deemed it acceptable.

“But none of that was actually accepting what the IRA did was terrorism and it was wrong – and considering she is associated with having supported the IRA terrorism, you need to be that emphatic,” she added.

A No10 Downing Street spokesman said: “Claire Fox has addressed her historic comments about the Troubles and acknowledged the pain that the families of the victims of terrorism have faced.

“She is not a Conservative peer, and her political views will differ from those of the Conservative Government.”

Claire Fox, now in her 60s, was said to have been involved in the RCP from her student days.

Though her career has been spent in the realm of politics as a campaigner and commentator, she has never served a term as an MP, or even a local councillor.

The only time she was elected to office was late last year, when she served as a Brexit Party MEP for North West England for seven months.

The News Letter tried to reach Ms Fox for comment via the Academy of Ideas, of which she is director.

No comment was received at time of writing.

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