Professor Bill Rolston:

We thank the committee for today’s invitation and for its steadfast work in promoting and protecting the Good Friday Agreement, GFA, including its work towards realising the full potential of the agreement by seeking its full implementation. Against the backdrop of almost four decades of violence in which over 3,600 people lost their lives and tens of thousands were physically and psychologically injured, the GFA was finally signed. This was welcomed by the majority of those who bore the brunt of the violence - those bereaved and injured. The GFA heralded a new era, not least one of hope. The agreement made provisions for rights, equality, justice and much more.

The signing of the Human Rights Act 1998 as an integral part of the agreement incorporated into domestic law the European Convention on Human Rights, ECHR. This, largely along with the ending of violence, provided bereaved relatives with a space to reflect and an agency to seek redress. It provide a human rights-based framework hitherto denied. Such agency enabled families to use the law, assert their rights and seek justice. It signalled a potential end to impunity and in 2010, the appointment of an Attorney General further added to that rights framework.

In the two and half decades since the signing of the GFA, the UK response to legacy issues - outstanding issues of truth and justice arising from the conflict - has been shameful. Overall, its approach is self-serving. It has deliberately frustrated due process and flouted law.

In respect to its own role in the conflict, the UK has determined a policy of denial, delay and obfuscation. Paralleling this has been the systematic destruction of evidence by state authorities and the deliberate withholding of resources in order to thwart justice. The use or, rather, misuse of the term "national security", public interest immunity certificates and even secret courts - what are called call "closed material procedures" - that lock out families and their legal representatives in civil cases are all a regular occurrence. The result is that matters drag on for decades while relatives wait for justice.

The arbitrary insertion of a national security veto by the UK after the signing of the Stormont House Agreement on legacy was typically in keeping with that approach. It was described by the then Minister for Justice, Charlie Flanagan, as a "smothering blanket of national security". It was there to conceal evidence. We now know that as the Stormont House Agreement was being negotiated, the Northern Ireland Office, NIO, was secretly depositing in archives at Kew Gardens files relating to controversial killings by the British army with orders prohibiting their release for decades. Some related to the killings of children by plastic bullets. Such sleight of hand is commonplace and was evident in the passage of the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill when Lord Caine made amendments on inquests once he realised coroners had made efforts to expedite hearings to ensure completion before the law became fully operational. His amendment ensured the majority of inquests will never be completed.

The UK Government claims that the current system does not work, takes far too long and does not deliver the right outcomes, including that there is no agreed way forward on legacy. It says, therefore, that its legacy Bill is a new departure but this is an exercise in breathtaking hypocrisy. In reality, the UK is a bad faith actor with vested interests. With the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill now enacted into law, the UK has simply amalgamated all of the underhand tactics used against families seeking accountable justice into one Act and one body, the Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery, ICRIR, which is anything but independent.

It is our view that the Act breaches Articles 2 and 3 of the ECHR and hollows out key provisions within and directly related to the GFA. It sounds like a lot but I will provide the committee with 12 bullet points that itemise our issues with the legislation. The ICRIR will not conduct Article 2-compliant investigations but rather will perform desktop reviews. Families will have no input save for victim impact statements, which, in truth, have no standing. Families will not be afforded rights of representation. There will be no openness or transparency. All matters of review will be conducted in secret. Families may not even be told if an individual responsible for and-or involved in the killing of their loved one has applied for and been granted immunity or amnesty. Once amnesty is granted, there can be no investigation even if this Act is repealed at a later stage. A British secretary of state will have ultimate control as the Act confers all key powers on his or her office. This includes determining who is granted amnesty or immunity and who is not and which cases are to be prioritised and reviewed. Reviews will not examine thematic patterns and linked cases. The Act imposes a legal obligation on the ICRIR that it must grant immunity from prosecution when a person has requested such immunity, where the person has "provided an account which is true to the best of their knowledge and belief" and where the panel is satisfied the conduct described would appear to expose the person to prosecution for one or more serious Troubles-related offences. The threshold for obtaining immunity, therefore, is quite clear and arguably constitutes an amnesty. In this regard, the Act disapplies the terms of the GFA in respect of sentencing within a court of law of a person found to have been convicted for a conflict-related offence. One of the main stated objectives of this Act is to protect British soldiers from investigation.

Last week, the challenge by families against this Act concluded in the High Court in Belfast. Arguably, this is the single most important legal challenge in decades. Once judgment is delivered, whichever side loses, will inevitably appeal and thereafter it will again be appealed to the UK Supreme Court. This will take considerable time over the coming years. Only then can this matter go to the European Court of Human Rights, ECHR. This is time families cannot afford. The age profile of relatives means that many will die waiting. The heartache and additional harms continue causing intergenerational trauma, torturing families whose lives have been turned upside down and who have been failed time after time. The sweeping and systematic breaches within this Act with respect to the ECHR, the GFA and the Human Rights Act, which affect all victims, place a responsibility on the Irish Government to act. Having patiently and in good faith tried every conceivable diplomatic effort to avoid the passing of this Act by the British Government, we believe there is only one position left and that is for the Irish Government to initiate an interstate case challenging the Act.

Expediting the case to Strasbourg is also a humanitarian issue. Many leading legal experts believe such a challenge would be successful. We acknowledge that ultimately, this is a political decision. It would have widespread support here and internationally. The British Labour Party has committed to repealing the Act if it is to come to power in the next British general election. Taking an inter-state case would certainly add to ensuring that this commitment would be honoured.

There is an attempt through this Act to extinguish the rights that flow from and hopes envisaged in the Good Friday Agreement. Collectively, we should all play a role in ensuring those rights are assured and hope remains. Families, NGOs, lawyers, academics, civil society and countless others, including this distinguished committee, are all playing their part. Families will never give up. As a signatory and guarantor of the Good Friday Agreement and the Stormont House Agreement, it is time for the Irish Government to once again play its part.