Patricia Ryan (Kildare South, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is all very well to talk about this but at some point there will have to be action. The Irish and British Governments need to take decisive action now. There has been too much kicking the can down the road. They cannot keep making new agreements and not delivering on them. Both Governments are like the boys who cried wolf. It has reached the stage where nobody trusts them. The Government must look at the existing agreements and start delivering on them. These agreements are the foundation stones for the peace that exists on this island, a very successful peace that has transformed this island in the past two decades.

The past cannot be changed or undone. The suffering and pain experienced in our society cannot be brushed aside or hidden away. All sides, including the State, must make a positive contribution to acknowledging the past and working towards reconciliation and healing. There are victims and survivors on all sides. Many of them still live with the psychological and physical scars of the conflict. Sinn Féin acknowledges the grief associated with all the lives that were lost. On all sides of the conflict, all victims deserve acknowledgement of their pain and loss as the first step towards a healing process. The best way to achieve that is through the establishment of an independent international truth commission.

The British Government wants to push through an amnesty for those who carried out acts of British state murder in Ireland, including those who were responsible for the atrocities of Bloody Sunday and Ballymurphy; those who murdered Pat Finucane, Rosemary Nelson and Councillor Eddie Fullerton; those who carried out the Dublin and Monaghan bombings, and the British soldiers who, in 1974, shot John Pat Cunningham in the back - a vulnerable adult with the mental age of a seven year old who ran from them in fear. I have met families of victims. They have spoken of being retraumatised by the British Government's attempt to hide its shameful acts. It is time for the Government to start to show it is serious about peace, truth and the real reconciliation.

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