Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Ms Hinds is very welcome. It is good to have an opportunity to exchange with her again. I very much welcome her opening comments with regard to the despicable, deplorable act and attack on the off-duty PSNI officer in Omagh last week. As she said, "There can be [absolutely] no tolerance of such attacks, or of the continuing presence of paramilitarism of any colour in Northern Ireland." We all wholeheartedly agree with that statement. It is sad that 25 years on from the signing of the Good Friday Agreement the word "paramilitarism" is still part of our everyday vocabulary. Hopefully, that will be consigned to history in the not-too-distant future. I fully realise this involves only a very small number of people but a small number of people can do awful damage. There can be no tolerance in society for their behaviour, thuggery and criminality.

Ms Hinds's entire contribution was very honest, forthright, heartfelt and given with great clarity. I concur with the Cathaoirleach in saying that. From my memory of watching the proceedings and negotiations at that time, I always regarded the Northern Ireland Women's Coalition as being very progressive and courageous in its work. That is underlined even more by Ms Hinds's comments on the unacceptable language its members were subjected to and the unacceptable behaviour of some of the participants. We often hear a person described as a trailblazer and that is the case when we look back and see the background to the work Ms Hinds did and what she did so well. I recall Ms Monica McWilliams, Ms Hinds and others always came across as being on top of their subject. They always gave the impression of being in no way intimidated, as no one should be in any negotiations. Ms Hinds did that work so well and in such a courageous way that benefited society. We need that continued work.

Ms Hinds mentioned that the civic forum was not enthusiastically received by the larger parties. She might elaborate on that later. My recollection is that civic forum only lasted a short time. One of the subsequent agreements - I think the St. Andrews Agreement - provided for another civic forum to be established but it did not ever get going, for any length of time anyway. That was very unfortunate because I knew some of the people who participated in the first civic forum, who always said it was very worthwhile to bring in the relevant stakeholders and partners. Nowadays, in this State, people call for a citizens' assembly, no matter what subject is discussed, without any preparatory work being done on different topics. It is a shame the civic forum did not continue to exist in order to have the views of people outside the political arena.

It is most disappointing that a bill of rights has not been established. Ms Hinds also mentioned the single equality Act she worked towards, along with the offices of the First and deputy First Ministers, which did not materialise either. The importance of the bill of rights and the single equality Act comes into focus when we think of Brexit and the damage it could do in the undermining and diminution of rights, as Ms Hinds referenced.

On the legacy Bill, it is absolutely reprehensible and deplorable that any government could bring forward such proposals. Ms Hinds quite rightly referred to the great work of Ms Sandra Peake and her colleagues in WAVE. The Government and all political parties in the Oireachtas have very clearly outlined that the British proposals are totally unacceptable. They give a licence to murderers to pardon themselves. That should not be acceptable in any democracy or society. It totally discards the work, pain and grief, and the efforts to which people have gone to try get the truth in regard to what happened to their loved ones, who may have lost their lives or been seriously injured through the activities of some members of state forces and some paramilitary organisations. It is utterly deplorable that any such suggestion could come from any government. For victims and survivors, that legislation is anything but victim centred. It is the very antithesis of what victim-centred supports should be. We need a particular emphasis on addressing the many outstanding issues pertaining to victims and the suffering and grief so many families still go through.

In all the contributions made to date as part of this particular work the committee is undertaking, there has been a clear emphasis on progress only being made when the two Governments worked closely together. As Ms Hinds remarked, the respective partnerships between prime ministers and taoisigh were an essential ingredient for talks to succeed. Over the past few years, the relationships between the British and Irish Governments have not been as cordial, positive or progressive as we would like them to be. We sincerely hope the new framework for the protocol under Mr. Sunak's government will improve matters.

It is not for the want of efforts on the part of Irish Governments that the relationship has deteriorated. It is essential that the outstanding aspects of the Good Friday Agreement are progressed as soon as possible. We can itemise the deficiencies in regard to the agreement and what has not happened but it is always important we remember what has been achieved and that the island we all live on today is transformed thanks to the Good Friday Agreement and it is not the island we experienced for decades up until 1998. To my recollection, there was not an election in 1996 to decide on the parties to the multi-party talks.