Mr. Paul O'Connor:

It was remiss of me not to respond to Deputy Conlan's other comment. Mr. Gormally reminded me of the Deputy's point, which I had also noted. While I recognise that this will be an uphill struggle, no one imagined we would be in a position where the British Prime Minister would describe Bloody Sunday as unjustified and unjustifiable and that he would stand up in Parliament and state that agents of the state had colluded in the murder of Pat Finucane. However, he did so and he also met Geraldine Finucane in 10 Downing Street where he accepted there had been collusion in her husband's murder, before contradictorily stating he could not allow an inquiry into the murder because there were too many people in nearby buildings who would not allow it.

In many ways, I believe we have won many of the battles. I am by nature a person who believes the glass is half full. We have won the battles and now need to identify what types of mechanisms will be established to deal with them. Nevertheless, I am not hopelessly naive. The documents are there and a number of them, particularly some pertaining to the Dublin and Monaghan bombings, worry people in Whitehall. The efforts made by this State have served to put the issue on the agenda and have shown that the problem has not gone away. These need to continue.

I also believe the issue with regard to U2 is helpful. The band will soon play concerts in London where the audience will be faced with questions about an atrocity many of them will never have heard of and a programme which states the British Government should release the files. It is important that the joint committee and the Oireachtas press the British on the issue of these documents. The British Government has done things in the past couple of years we did not believe it would do.