Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill

Paul Girvan Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 4th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Conor Burns]

The right hon. Gentleman is, in a real sense, right to raise those concerns, but the way the process is being set up in the Bill provides more than a possibility that we can find a way of doing this in an inclusive sense—in a way that creates a complete picture of the troubles for future generations to understand—and that will certainly not involve the glorification of acts of terrorism. He is right—and he is right that I alluded to this—that the state holds not just significant information about what the state was responsible for, but significant intelligence-based information on the actions of others that may not ever have been acknowledged before. That will be part of the oral history—the official history, if you like—of the troubles.

Under clause 48, the cross-community, cross-sectoral advisory panel, which will consist of a range of organisations with a defined interest and expertise in this area, will include representation and voices from the victims’ sector. That should provide some reassurance that there will be voices in there making sure that this is not a one-sided account of the history of the troubles.

[Paul Girvan (South Antrim) (DUP)]

rose—

[Gavin Robinson]

rose—

[Conor Burns]

I will give way to the hon. Member for South Antrim (Paul Girvan) and then to the hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson). I will then finish, and then the Committee can consider the clauses in detail.

[Paul Girvan]

On the last point, we have a difficulty in that many organisations have been set up to tell the story of victims and to fight on the victims’ side, but there are a large number of victims—I can talk personally, from a family point of view—who do not want to engage with anybody because they want to put this sad history behind them: unlike a lot of people who want to keep opening this up, they want to bury it. Where are those people’s views ever going to be heard? That is the difficulty that I have. Members of my own family will not engage with any victims’ groups. They do not want to be involved with them because they believe they all have an agenda and, for some, it is to rewrite history. We fear that this process will be used as an opportunity to rewrite history and to bring forward a narrative that will suit, primarily, in my case, a republican agenda, which will be spun by those who have a machine behind them set up to do that.

[Conor Burns]

I entirely understand where the hon. Gentleman is coming from and I entirely understand what he says about the range of views within victims’ groups, and even within individual families, about how they want to approach this. In a sense, there is no right or wrong thing to do here. These are matters of judgment, and the view that the Secretary of State and the Government have come to on how we proceed is that this gives a chance for a degree of reconciliation that is not delivered by the existing institutions.

For those who take the view that the hon. Gentleman describes and want to be cut off from the process and freed from thinking about it, often because what happened is so intensely painful to them that the pain of connecting to the events and to the losses is overpowering, we totally and utterly respect that. No one will be compelled to participate in an oral history or a remembrance of an event if they do not want to, but for those who do, it will be there. We will set it up as I have described, involving victims’ organisations and the cross-sectoral, cross-community advisory panel, to try to make it as inclusive and as embracing as it can possibly be.

Rather like the information recovery body itself, however, the success or otherwise of the memorialisation process will be judged only when it is up and running. It will be judged only when people can see what is happening and can make a judgment call on whether we have achieved, in the institutions we are creating, the objectives we set ourselves and the chance for greater reconciliation in Northern Ireland.

Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill

Paul Girvan Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 18th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Jim Shannon]

Kenneth took us shooting when we were small. I remember him well; he instilled a love of the countryside in me. I named my first son Jamie Kenneth after him. Jamie is 35 years old, and he has that same love of the countryside. My cousin Kenneth lives through him. Three people were responsible for his murder. Two of them are dead. One of them was never made accountable. Where is the justice for Kenneth and our family?

Where is the justice for Lexie Cummings, murdered by the IRA in Strabane? His murderer escaped across the border, a prominent member of Sinn Féin and a former mayor of a council in Donegal. Where is the justice for the four UDR men murdered in Ballydugan—John Birch, Michael Adams, Steven Smart and John Bradley? I knew three of those boys—lovely young boys who loved their country and their families. Where is the justice for those four young men? Where is the justice for Louis Robinson, a detective kidnapped at the border at South Armagh, tortured, beaten up and murdered by the IRA? No one was ever made accountable. There is no justice for Louis Robinson and his family.

[Paul Girvan (South Antrim) (DUP)]

My hon. Friend has just highlighted a number of individuals who potentially will never see justice. If the Bill goes through, the perpetrators can go out and glorify some of the actions they have been involved in. Unfortunately, this is a process of rewriting history.

[Jim Shannon]

When I think of my cousin Kenneth Smyth, I think of Daniel McCormick, a Roman Catholic. They were best friends and both served in the UDR, but Daniel left. He was murdered by the IRA. No one was ever made accountable. Stuart Montgomery was a young boy of 18 years old who joined the RUC. His daddy was so proud of him. He went to Pomeroy—three weeks in uniform—and was blown up by the IRA. No one was ever made accountable. Where is the justice for Stuart Montgomery and his family?

Where is the justice for Winston Donnell, the first UDR man murdered by the IRA up in County Tyrone? No one was ever made accountable. They left his family with broken hearts, bereft of a son. Where is the justice for Raymond McCord? Every one of us here knows Raymond. He will be watching on TV. His son was murdered by the UVF. Where is the justice for Raymond McCord? I mention all those people because I think it is important that we have them on the record. Senator Barnhill was murdered by the IRA in County Tyrone on the same day as my cousin Kenneth and Daniel McCormick. Again, where is the justice? I have named some of the people involved over the period of time. Those investigations and that quest for justice—we do not see it.

Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill

Paul Girvan Excerpts

Consideration of Lords message
Wednesday 6th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Jim Shannon]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his intervention. He has put on record very clearly his point of view, and it is one to which many of us here subscribe.

Let me return to the points that I was trying to make about the Secretary of State’s reply. Have those discussions taken place? Has the evidential base been gathered? Have the accusations of collusion between the Garda Síochána and the IRA been considered? There was the murder of Chief Superintendent Harry Breen and Superintendent Bob Buchanan in a car bomb on the border in 1989. The information that we have been made aware of indicates that details were passed to the IRA on what time they would be crossing the border. That is collusion. That is an evidential base for what happened. That information should be brought forward by the Republic of Ireland Government and conveyed to the Secretary of State and the Government here. There are many other such cases. For example, the murderers of Lexie Cummings in 1982 escaped across the border. The murderers of Ian Sproule in 1981 escaped across the border, and, again, the murderers of my own cousin, Kenneth Smyth, escaped across the border.

[Paul Girvan (South Antrim) (DUP)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way. As this was raised in an earlier intervention, it would be interesting to say to the House that someone came forward and volunteered information, saying that they had been involved in the IRA campaign, and yet they have never served one day either in court or in prison for that. They were questioned in 1988 and denied the allegation, but as recently as 2019 they made a full admission of their involvement in IRA activities. The case of the Hyde Park bomb, which saw 11 people killed and 51 injured, was never brought to court in relation to that. That was somebody who came forward recently and made that admission.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that matter. He has clearly outlined an evidential base, which has to be part of this process. Unfortunately, though, with this Bill that process does not continue in the way that we hoped it would.

I wish very quickly to speak to the Lords amendments. They have established minimum criminal justice standards for a “review” along the lines of Operation Kenova. The amendments would require the Secretary of State to make regulations prescribing the standards to which reviews by the Independent Commission for Reconciliation & Information Recovery are carried out, including what measures should be used to ensure that reviews comply sufficiently with the obligations under the European convention on human rights. The shadow Secretary of State, whom I welcome to his place, referred to that specifically in his contribution. I was very encouraged by his comments here today—I think we all were—and look forward to constructive engagement with him as we move forward. What is also covered is whether as much information as possible should be gathered by reviews in relation to death or harmful conduct, and whether all evidential opportunities should be explored by reviews. Victims must be consulted, and regulations can be changed if reviews are conducted in a way not envisaged.

That is what the Lords amendments were hoping to achieve. It is disappointing to me personally and to all of us who represent Northern Ireland that that has not been fully considered by the Government. It is regrettable that the Government have resisted efforts to embed minimum criminal justice standards at the heart of how the ICRIR conducts reviews. They seem intent not only on narrowing the legal routes, but weakening investigative standards in those aspects that remain. It is hard not to reach the conclusion that the distinction made between “review” and “investigation” in the context of the Bill is more about drawing a line under the past with minimal fuss in the shortest timeframe possible, than about actually securing the answers and information that the victims and their families deserve and crave.

In conclusion, it grieves me to stand against the Government on these issues, but, on behalf of the victims, I wish to say very clearly that those in the Public Gallery today expect to see all those who perpetrated and carried out crimes to be held accountable. That is not happening. The unfortunate thing for all of us here—those in the Public Gallery who have lost loved ones, we in this Chamber who have lost loved ones and for all of us who represent Northern Ireland—is that this is a retrograde step. It extinguishes very clearly the hope for justice that we all want for those people who lost their lives to the troubles.