Ms Emily Logan:

I thank the committee for the invitation to discuss the issues and potential risks raised by Brexit for human rights and equality protection across the island. I am very pleased to be here with our colleagues from the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, addressing the committee on this occasion in our capacity as the joint committee of both commissions established in the Good Friday Agreement.

The Belfast or Good Friday Agreement has legal status within international law as a peace treaty lodged with the United Nations. The agreement laid down not only a mandate for both national human rights institutions, but also the mechanism to ensure strong co-operation between them by way of the joint committee with representatives of the two bodies North and South "as a forum for consideration of human rights issues in the island of Ireland".

As members can see today, there is strong trust and a strong shared sense of purpose across both commissions. Today is an important opportunity to recall the commitments made back in 1998, which were grounded in the human rights and equality provisions of the 1998 agreement. However, as members know, the human rights and equality framework contained in the agreement assumed that the UK and Ireland would continue to be members of the European Union. Although the joint report of December 2017 committed to protecting the agreement in all its parts, Brexit negotiations currently depart from that common framework creating risks for both rights and remedies.

While the joint committee has worked collaboratively for many years, I will limit my remarks to the joint committee’s work relevant to today’s discussion. As a joint committee, we were pleased to see the UK’s commitment to no diminution of rights as to protecting the Good Friday Agreement, in the joint report of December 2017. In March 2018, the joint committee published its policy statement on the matter and made six key recommendations that ought to be adhered to in the UK-EU negotiations on the withdrawal agreement that followed.

First, we strongly recommended the retention of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights in UK law, as well as a clear and enforceable commitment to no diminution of human rights and equality standards following withdrawal. The UK Government committed in December 2017 to ensuring that no diminution of rights is caused by its departure from the European Union. The draft withdrawal agreement published in November 2018 narrowed this commitment to the rights included in the rights, safeguards and equality of opportunity section of the Good Friday Agreement 1998 insofar as those rights or standards are protected by EU membership.

We called for the withdrawal agreement to provide for the continuing North-South equivalence of rights.

We believe that the offer of continued EU citizenship or equivalent rights should be extended to all the people of Northern Ireland as defined by the Good Friday Agreement, given recognition of "the birthright of all the people of Northern Ireland to identify themselves and be accepted as Irish or British, or both, as they may so choose". The last situation we wish to see is one where the people of Northern Ireland feel forced to choose an identity based on what they think their post-Brexit entitlements might be.

We believe that any increase in border controls would impact negatively on the exercise of rights. People on both sides of the Border between Ireland and Northern Ireland regularly cross the Border to exercise their right to work, to access public services, including health and education, and to visit family, for example. The protection of Border communities and migrant workers remains paramount when we consider issues that go beyond the common travel area arrangements in terms of protecting rights.

The fifth recommendation is about ensuring evolving justice arrangements comply with the commitment to non-diminution of rights, which continues to be a concern for the joint committee. These include the operation of the European arrest warrant; how prisoners are repatriated and transferred between member states; how policing co-operation takes place when the UK is no longer a member of Europol; how information and data are shared for criminal justice purposes; and how cross-Border justice arrangements will take place on the island of Ireland. The protection of human rights is closely linked to ensuring accountability for human rights violations and co-operation in criminal justice investigations is, therefore, critical.

The final recommendation by the joint committee is the right to participation in public life, another aspect of the North-South equivalence of rights under the 1998 agreement. It is important to consider how those in Northern Ireland, to whom EU citizenship is to be offered exceptionally after Brexit, will continue to be represented in EU democratic institutions.

I repeat and reiterate Professor Harvey's point about recognising the contribution of people both here today and beyond who have ensured that human rights and equality have been given the attention they deserve.

For the purpose of the meeting, I will chronicle the efforts of the joint committee North and South, particularly throughout 2018. It started by meeting the Tánaiste, Deputy Coveney, and the Brexit co-ordination team in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. We met ambassadors and key officials in the UK and Irish permanent missions at the United Nations Office in Geneva and the EU in Brussels. We met the Article 50 task force on three occasions in 2018, including chief negotiator, Mr. Michel Barnier, deputy chief negotiator, Ms Sabine Weyand, and Northern Ireland adviser, Ms Nina Obermaier. We travelled to Westminster to meet with Mr. Robin Walker MP, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Exiting the European Union, and his officials. We also met Lord Duncan, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, at Stormont House a number of times. In each of these meetings, and in particular with the task force, we made clear that, as a joint committee with a mandate in statute, we wished to have as formal a role as possible in the post-Brexit monitoring of human rights and equality on the island of Ireland.

In November 2018, we launched research commissioned by the joint committee and carried out by academics at Newcastle University, Durham University and the University of Birmingham. The research recommended that both the Irish and UK Governments should look to secure a “gold standard” approach through a new intergovernmental common travel arrangement, provided through a treaty. Such a treaty would formalise common immigration rules, travel rights, residency rights and related rights to education, social security, work, health, security and justice. Of particular concern in our work at this crucial period of the negotiations, and possibly also of concern to the justice and equality committee, are the issues of North-South equivalence of rights on an ongoing basis and the guarantee of equality of citizenship.

I thank the committee for the invitation to appear before it.