Mr. Mark Durkan:

I thank Senator Currie. I mentioned the rights provisions of the agreement in the opening statement. They simply have not been fulfilled on so many counts. I will not rehearse them all here. Even when we had a Labour government, it was dilutory about the question of a bill of rights. It introduced a false precondition that is not in the agreement that there would have to be all-party consensus before there could be legislation on a bill of rights. The agreement was written to state that the bill of rights would be legislated for in the Westminster Parliament because we knew we could not get all-party agreement on the bill of rights in the Assembly or Executive. It was outsourced to the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission to draw up proposals for what might be in a bill of rights, but there was a guarantee that the UK Government would legislate for a bill of rights, as the nearest thing one could get to entrenchment in those circumstances.

Various arguments were given whenever different parties and groups sought movement on the bill of rights. Former secretaries of state made statements to indicate that nothing would really be added by a bill of rights that is not already covered in the EU charter on social and economic rights, or by the European Convention on Human Rights. We know the EU charter no longer applies to the North. We are looking at a situation where the ECHR applies less and less. Various legislation has already ousted the ECHR as something people can use in the courts of Northern Ireland, such as the United Kingdom Internal Market Act.

The legacy issue is one of the areas in which the agreement itself is deficient. I recall raising with Mo Mowlam on the night in question that the words had very little to do with victims or legacy. She told me not to worry as the Women's Coalition had already contacted her about that, and she agreed. I still do not think the words that were added were enough. I can understand why people were diffident about putting in too much about legacy issues. They were afraid that if we got into text that rehearsed things that happened in the past, it could become quite difficult. The UK Government had previously appointed Kenneth Bloomfield to produce a report on legacy victims. People used the point that they did not want to pre-empt that in some way or tilt at its independence. Not all parties were necessarily happy with the prospect of what Kenneth Bloomfield might produce. That created a situation where the agreement was more silent on legacy issues and victims than it should have been. That is a point I have made whenever I have engaged with others from the DUP, Sinn Féin, trade unions and other groups. When talking with people involved in the Colombian peace process, one point that I always made to them was to learn the lesson from our process that they need to address legacy issues up-front and face up and not to think they would take care of themselves or could be avoided afterwards.

I am glad that the Government and Opposition here are explicit in their opposition to the UK Government's Bill. It basically vanquishes any prospect of serious rights to truth or justice for victims. Nobody is necessarily trying to pretend that there would ever be a possibility of a huge number of prosecutions in unresolved cases, but the justice standard is the standard at which these matters need to be approached. Most victims' groups are realistic about what the real prospect for truth translating into prosecution is, but they want to know that truth will be pursued and yielded. They know that the approach of the British Government is to turn off that search for truth by pretending that it will somehow emancipate or invite all sorts of releases of truth from people who have, until now, hidden things and are determined to continue to hide things for their own reasons. It has been criticised as being an amnesty and it is an amnesty in that sense.

Senator Currie mentioned the Hain legislation in 2005. It, too, was for an amnesty. It provided that anybody could go to a tribunal in secret and get a certificate that provided immunity to prosecution. That certificate could be given an added seal of secrecy by the Secretary of State, so that the only people who might go to jail for any events of the past would be family members or media who might speculate that somebody got a certificate relating to a particular incident or crime. It seems crazy that victims or survivors could end up being jailed and that journalists seeking truth could end up being prosecuted as a result of the Hain legislation, while perpetrators would not be prosecuted. Perpetrators did not have to come forward themselves. Anybody could do it on their behalf.

I remember challenging that legislation with a raft of amendments to try to expose just how pernicious it was and to challenge how one would prevent a situation where certificates would be issued in circumstances where people had not sought those certificates or were not admitting any involvement in those offences. It was an amnesty that was agreed in 2005. Thankfully, that Bill was withdrawn after enough victims' groups persuaded Sinn Féin to withdraw its support for the Bill, which it had supported on its introduction even though it clearly provided for an amnesty for anybody who wanted one. That included loyalists, security forces and anybody accused on the republican side too.