Ms Anne Cadwallader:

Good. What was very important from the Pat Finucane Centre's point of view is that when we make allegations and statements, we do so on the basis of evidence. We are not interested in what the dogs in the street say or do, we are interested in hard evidence. Our families are also similarly interested in hard evidence. When Senator Daly talked about the number of cases that remain to be investigated, that is problematic. If I could illustrate that, there is one case for example, a triple murder, that the HET did investigate. The HET discovered that the RUC closed down the investigation into those three murders after two weeks. They did virtually nothing. Now that case is in some definitions closed because the HET has investigated it. However, those three families are totally frustrated because they have been told that there was no police investigation into their case. The HET has confirmed it, so they want to ask why. That is a case which on one level could be said to be closed, but as far as the families are concerned, is certainly not closed.

On the British trying to escape their obligations under the European convention, even if they walked away from the convention tomorrow, they would still have to answer questions and be responsible for their actions during the time that they were signatories to the convention. They cannot escape their obligations there. On the intergenerational trauma, and how children and children of children are being traumatised and are throwing themselves into investigating cases, there is one example that I can give of the great-grandchild of one of the hooded men who is now involved in his great-grandfather's case. This is not a question of letting people die. The trauma will continue and survive down the decades if it is not resolved.

Dare I even suggest that in this State, your trauma from the Civil War remains unresolved. We are coming to some anniversaries of that and I think that will be evident in the discussion that will go on at that time. In Spain, after the Spanish Civil War, they had an agreement to forget and people sometimes said to us in the North: "why can't you be like the Spanish and have an agreement to forget?" Well, I do not think they are saying that quite so much at the moment.

Finally, the HET, imperfect as it is was, did some good work, especially in the Glenanne series and there are others as well. It was not perfect, it did some really terrible investigations but it did do some good ones. The British Government is absolutely terrified of this being repeated. They are terrified about what they did during the conflict being exposed. They are terrified, but there is a massive possible benefit for the community in the North. If people in the North understood much better what went on during the conflict and how they were manipulated, and how cynical forces they knew nothing of at the time, were involved, then the potential for reconciliation would be much greater.

As far as the Pat Finucane Centre is concerned, we do represent people from both communities. We would not pretend that is equal. The community in the North is so divided that people will only go and ask for help from organisations they believe they can trust. We do have families from the Protestant-unionist- loyalist community that we advocate on behalf of. Most of them, if they come to us for help, do not want anyone to hear about it. We totally respect that confidential request and so I cannot tell the committee about it. There are not as many as from the Catholic-nationalist community, but there are such people, and we quietly in the background do a lot of work that we cannot talk about. That would include that line of inquiry, that line of investigation.