Mr. Patrick Corrigan:

I thank the Chairman for that question. We make reference to resources and the cost of putting these mechanisms in place and call on the relevant Government authorities, including those in London and Dublin, in addition to Stormont, to deliver adequate resources to ensure we have effective mechanisms that can address what happened in the past in delivering on victims' rights to access truth and justice. The mechanisms we have in place which are flawed and sometimes fail cost a significant amount. We believe they should be brought together in a single overarching mechanism as a way of doing the job properly and ensuring the resources being spent on failing initiatives are spent on an effective mechanism.

On the wider question of the peace dividend post-1994 or 1998, there has been economic improvement in some respects in Northern Ireland, in addition to the huge gains made owing to the relative lack of violence and disorder compared to the previous period. However, it is clear from the research that the economic dividend has not been spread equally across all communities in Northern Ireland and that those who were poorest during the period of the conflict and suffered the most violence are still the poorest and in the most deprived regions.

There has been a dogged blockage of the transformation of those communities. We fear that the systems and decision making in terms of resource allocation are still not there yet. We would argue that a human-rights-based approach to resource allocation and political decision-making in Northern Ireland would be beneficial in the context of addressing the needs of the most deprived communities. That is why we would advocate the development of a bill of rights, not only in order to address some of the civil and political injustices of the past which persist into the present but also the economic and social rights deprivations from the past which also remain today. We think there is a very powerful case for putting in place a framework that would assist politicians in making decisions that would improve the lives of the most vulnerable and the poorest in Northern Ireland; not to tie their hands or to make decisions for them but to enable them to make key decisions which are transformative and which will help to embed the peace. These are interlinked issues and we should not just focus on short-term measures and mechanisms or indeed, on the formal mechanisms for addressing the past but try to develop a human rights based society in Northern Ireland which has been lacking in the past.