Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the witnesses. Their presentation addressed the foundational architecture or pillars for an inclusive society, which is key to the Good Friday Agreement. There are probably people watching this meeting in their own homes at the moment as it is being broadcast live. A lot of people will be scratching their heads and asking why would anyone be opposed to a bill of rights. Professor McWilliams outlined why governments would be opposed as it calls them to account. The difficulty seems to be that some people do not feel there is a need for one. I presume those people are not impacted by rights issues as a group. I think that is part of the difficulty.

The witnesses' paper stated that the two main Unionist parties believe it is the responsibility of others to convince them there is a need for a bill of rights. The same two parties probably had a view in the past that majoritarianism was okay, that a one-party state was okay, that a Protestant parliament for a Protestant people was okay and that gerrymandering was okay. Some might say that could have been wrong at the time. They might say discrimination did not really happen that much in jobs, housing and so on. While some people look at the past and say it was not really that bad, there are other sections of society which feel that they were left out. The Good Friday Agreement was about creating a fair and inclusive society and this is one of the pillars that was to hold it all up. We are left with this.

We put it to a vote and a majority of people on both parts of the island voted overwhelmingly in favour of it but nothing happened. People were scratching their heads and said they thought they agreed to this. It was part of the new way forward but the two Governments sat back and left it to the parties to decide.

There is common agreement across the broad spectrum of politics in Ireland that this is not going to happen and we will leave it to the new party. The difficulty is where we go from here. Clearly, only the two Governments will move it forward. One Government has broken off because it has said legislation introduced by the European Parliament is undermining British sovereignty and, therefore, it will go ahead and do its own thing. The crux of the matter is how we move forward from here. If we are serious about it and believe it is needed, and I think it is, how can we move it forward? It should be taken out of the responsibility of the parties because they cannot or will not agree. Responsibility for it has to be put back in the hands of the two Governments. One Government is pulling away from the process, while the other has made statements and so on but is not pushing ahead, even though there is supposed to be equivalence within the process.

One reason Unionists give for not agreeing to a bill of rights is that it would include people they do not believe should have full rights, such as gay and lesbian people. They will say there is no way they will sign up to such legislation. In a way, they are cherry-picking who should have rights and who should not, and that is part of the difficulty. That is why I am saying the process should no longer be the responsibility of those parties. If they cannot agree, we should be pushing forward.