Mr. Patrick Corrigan:

I will pick up on some of the questions on the responsibilities of the UK and Irish Governments to deliver in terms of what happened the past and whether it seems to us that they are prepared to fulfil that role. When we met the Haass team at the beginning of September just at the point where we were about to publish our report – we provided it with an advance copy – we wished it well with its endeavours, but we noted at that stage that there were two crucial actors missing from the Haass talks, namely, the UK Government and the Irish Government. Whatever one might say about delivery on flags and parades being very much a devolved issue, dealing with the past is an issue that spreads across the jurisdictions and responsibility for delivering the powers, resources and co-operation to make these mechanisms work for victims is shared in Belfast, Dublin and London. One of the weaknesses of the outcome of the Haass process is that there is a lack of clarity about where the UK and Irish Governments now sit and the degree to which they are in a position to deliver fully. We must take at face value the public commitment that has since come from Ministers in both the UK and Irish Governments that they broadly endorse the Haass proposals and that they stand prepared to deliver. What we think is missing is a more proactive leadership role. That is a shared responsibility in dealing with the past and it will be important – as we said in our full response to the Haass document – that authorities and archives in the Republic of Ireland and the UK are made available to the investigative units, the HIU and the ICIR. Work could now be done, without waiting necessarily for the Northern Ireland party discussions to pick up again, to scope out, in particular, in terms of legislation or other commitments from government that could be made by Westminster and the Oireachtas.

It is clear that work will be required on the delivery of the Haass proposals. More than lip service could be paid to this and work could be under way. That shows more than a sitting back and a waiting for the process to take its course. We very much welcome the verbal commitments given by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and the Tánaiste and the Taoiseach in response to the Haass proposals, but there is more work to be done. It was correct to identify that we had seen shortcomings elsewhere. We have not seen an inquiry for which we and the Finucane family have called into the murder of Pat Finucane. We have not seen a public inquiry established into the circumstances leading up to and following the Omagh bombing. We have seen shortcomings elsewhere, including in the delivery of other parts of the Good Friday Agreement. The Bill of Rights still remains an undelivered part of the commitments given by the two sovereign Governments in 1998 and Amnesty International, with hundreds of other civil society groups in Northern Ireland, still want to see delivery on it. We think it would play a useful role in establishing a human rights framework to tackle some of the other contentious decisions that Northern Ireland faces all of the time. It might be flags and parades on the agenda at the moment, but it might be other issues in a year’s time. Until we have that long-term human rights framework in place, we will continue to be faced with short-term crises and crisis discussions about how we find short-term mechanisms or solutions to these issues.

We urge the UK and Irish Governments to play a very active role in trying to bring agreement and show their bona fides in delivering on the Haass proposals and ironing out these wrinkles, as Mr. Durkan identified, and in also considering what else they might need to do outside of the confines of the Haass proposals to deliver for victims in other jurisdictions. We are aware that there are victims in both the Republic of Ireland and Great Britain and elsewhere who also appeal for truth and justice in their cases. The UK and Irish Governments clearly have responsibilities to them.