Ms Michelle Gildernew:

Cuirim fáilte roimh na finnéithe. It has been great to hear from them. An ex-prisoner in my constituency was injured trying to save lives in a nightclub in County Tyrone. Not only was he denied compensation for that but also he had to pay for his own physiotherapy treatment. He was denied ongoing medical assistance because of the fact that he was an ex-political prisoner. This is far-reaching. I wish to point out that the attempts at legislating against ex-prisoners have been extremely insidious. Gerry Kelly could be a minister in the Executive but he could not be a special adviser. If the second legislation had gone through, he would not have been able to sit on the policing board. Do any of panel want to discuss that? The total of 40,000 people is a great many ex-prisoners. A big chunk of society is being denied a voice and the chance to play a positive part in their society moving on. The transgenerational issues are certainly affected. Thousands of people are affected by travel bans and such things. That has been touched on already. There are layers and layers of discrimination and it is really useful to discuss them in this forum today. I thank the three witnesses for coming, and the committee for facilitating them. I would also like to make the point that I know how hard they have worked with loyalist groups. We tried for many months to get them into this meeting as well. It is not that they have not been invited, but that they have not been able to send somebody.