Ms Alyson Kilpatrick:

I thank the Chairman for the opportunity to address the committee on behalf of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission. I am very sorry that I am unable to join the meeting in person and I am sure I am missing out by not being there.

Ms Gibney has outlined the contours of Article 2 of the protocol very well and I will not repeat any of that. As members already know, the protocol was hard won and provides valuable protection against the extremes of Brexit. However, the protocol is neither comprehensive nor foolproof in how it defends humans rights. As our time is short, and I have many examples that we may get to later, I will restrict my opening remarks to outlining a few of the most pressing risks to the Good Friday Agreement human rights commitments but bearing in mind the interests of this committee. I must start by mentioning the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill. While we welcome the UK Government's stated commitment that the no-diminution provision in the protocol is "non-controversial", the Bill itself undermines the strengths and reliability of that commitment, which obviously gives us some grave concerns.

The Bill offers a degree of protection, whereby Ministers may not classify protocol Article 2 as an excluded provision. In other words, the Bill purports to prevent a departure from Article 2 but the actual provisions of the Bill go on to weaken that very protection in quite a considerable way. For example, the Bill states that UK courts will no longer be bound by decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union. That is a difficulty when it is the UK Government's duty to keep pace with the six equality directives in Annex 1 to the protocol, so that is a directly contrary undertaking compared with the protocol commitment. The most immediate impact on the Good Friday Agreement is an undermining of the application and enforcement of rights. I am sure that I do not need to remind members that these rights are central to that agreement.

Next, and probably the most obvious, is the risk posed to the Bill of Rights legislation, which has been mentioned and I am sure that we will hear more about today. It is a repeal of the Human Rights Act and this is much more than technical amendments to "rebalance rights". The Bill changes, and I would say that it critically weakens, the substance, application and enforcement of rights. Consequently, rather than bringing rights home, as the Human Rights Act was meant to do and as we were told at the time, the Bill has sent many of them packing along with those who claim these rights. While I accept there has been a reprieve, depending on whom one reads, by the parking or shelving of this Bill, the UK Government has not resiled from the policy objectives reflected in the Bill so we cannot assume that it is not going to be reimposed. If the Bill is returned to, or a different approach is taken but with a similar intention, the commission is deeply concerned about the effect on fundamental rights in Northern Ireland.

Consequently, despite the shelving of the Bill, I will take a brief moment to share a few words on it now.

Perhaps I can reflect our concerns better by saying there will be real consequences to this Bill, whether in part or piecemeal, in that there will be a hierarchy of rights and rights holders - it is clear to me that is partly the intention of the Bill - which is the very thing human rights is meant to protect us all from. By way of deliberate provision, people will be made unequal. Human rights will no longer be universally applied. We have to remember the creation of a system in which rights are universally enjoyed was the signal purpose of the universal declaration and everything else that it follows. This is very significant. It is easy to over-quote "existential survival" but it really is that. Human rights value everybody equally, even if others do not. This Bill threatens that very value.

Added to that, this Bill, or policy intention, limits people's access to court to complain about the breaches, which in themselves are probably limited. That is another bedrock of democracy and human rights that will be severely limited. That needs to be remembered in the context of the general mood and direction of travel, which I am sure McGahey will also discuss this afternoon. If a victim eventually makes it to court, and that prospect is much more unlikely, with a complaint about a breach, that court will no longer have to follow European Court of Human Rights, ECHR, Strasbourg case law in the way it previously did. We, as the dedicated mechanism, considered very specifically whether that would result in an actionable breach of protocol Article 2. In those deliberations and in the advice we received, we did not identify a direct actionable breach on the face of the Bill, but we noted and have communicated our concern about the downgrading of Strasbourg case law and the likely consequences of that. In my view, that will lead to a diminishing in standards without more. That in itself is significant enough to be taken very seriously.

The standards are already at a minimum. They are not high. Members will recall that the Good Friday Agreement provided for a bill of rights for Northern Ireland. That was to be ECHR plus, where the circumstances of Northern Ireland required it. Instead, this Bill indicates not only that a Northern Ireland Bill of rights is unlikely but it removes the closest thing anyone has to an actual Bill of rights, which is the Human Rights Act. Protocol Article 2 provides a degree of certainty and stability at a difficult time in Northern Ireland and must be retained. It is, however, insufficient alone. It is simply no substitute for the Human Rights Act and certainly not an alternative to the bill of rights for Northern Ireland.

I am speeding through and will speed up even more. I will mention the Nationality and Borders Act. The three commissions have flagged many concerns about it. I will restate our very grave concerns regarding the impact on the protection of trafficked persons. It is our joint assessment that the trafficking directive is within the scope of protocol Article 2, which means the no diminution commitment in the protocol should apply. We have identified several ways in which the Nationality and Borders Act may breach minimum standards laid out in that directive and therefore potentially breach protocol Article 2. I cannot tell members what we will do about it but we are carefully considering what our next steps will be. Ms Gibney mentioned the three commissions' concern about provision for electronic traveller authorisations in the Act. We reiterate that. We are very concerned about the impact on the enjoyment of rights to family and private life, especially, but not only, those in Border communities. We will keep a very close watching brief on this.

That brings me to my last, though it is still only an initial, concern, namely, the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill. I am sure the committee is aware of our grave concerns about this Bill from a human rights perspective. There are a number of potential breaches that are very obvious. In short, what is intended by the Bill will not comply with Articles 2 and 3 of the European convention, which are the fundamental rights to life and freedom from torture or ill-treatment. The reason this is so serious and relevant to everything else we will discuss is that it prevents by design independent and effective investigations of grave human rights abuses, including murder, torture and kidnap. It does precisely the opposite to what the European convention requires. It closes down effective, independent investigations. That should not be a political consideration; it is purely a legal one. The job we have as a human rights commission, certainly as the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, is to assess the compliance of this Bill with human rights standards. We have done that and we have attempted to assist, but we have concluded that it fails to comply to such an extent that we cannot offer recommendations to make it compliant. What may be of interest to the committee today although I cannot say a great deal more, technically, about it, is that in addition to the convention breaches we are also concerned the Bill may diminish the rights of victims in direct breach of the UK's obligations under protocol Article 2 because it fails to comply with standards set out in the EU victims directive, which we conclude and have advised comes within the scope of Article 2.

I echo what Ms Gibney said, and what I hope Ms McGahey will say, in that we are working closely together. We have made great progress in our work, on the dedicated mechanism in particular, through engagement, research and publications. I am enormously grateful to my fellow commissioners. I am the youngest of them by a little way. I do not mean in calendar age but in terms of service. I have been assisted greatly by both of them and their staff. I wanted to recognise that in this evidence session, in addition to my fellow commissioners in Northern Ireland, and the teams who have prepared all three of us and put so much into managing what at the start, certainly for me, seemed too vast and difficult a task. Somehow, we have pulled this together. We now know where we are with it and we look forward to being able to actually deliver some results. I look forward to members' questions. I will hand over to Ms McGahey.