Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The coroner Mrs. Justice Keegan reported after the longest running inquiry to date in Northern Ireland. Her findings could not have been clearer or more stark that over three shocking days in August of 1971, the ten victims who were shot and killed in the Ballymurphy area of west Belfast were entirely innocent and their killings were unjustified. Unjustified was as far as the coroner could legally go. Their names must be individually recalled in the House: Francis Quinn, Fr. Hugh Mullan, Noel Phillips, Joan Connolly, Daniel Teggart, Joseph Murphy, Edward Doherty, John Laverty, Joseph Corr and John McKerr.

Now that truth is properly in the public domain, it must be appropriately responded to by the British Prime Minister and Government.

In a letter addressed collectively to the families on 12 May, Prime Minister Johnson expressed his sorrow over what had happened. What is appropriate and proper is for him to travel to Belfast and extend his government’s apology directly to the families of the victims. He should also make a personal statement to the House of Commons, as a previous UK Prime Minister, Mr. David Cameron, did following the Bloody Sunday inquiry. It is also required that the measures in the painstaking work completed in the Stormont House Agreement be implemented now, particularly the paragraphs focused on dealing with legacy issues, namely paragraphs 21 to 55.

The heartbreaking legacy of decades of violence on our island and in Britain has left deep and lasting wounds. Those wounds stretch into many households. The Taoiseach referred to the Dublin and Monaghan bombings. My sister and her husband were seriously injured in the Film Centre, O’Connell Bridge House, in 1972. I remember the impact that had on our family. I recall going, as a young person, to see both of them in the Mater Hospital. It was surrounded by troops and gardaí because the chief of staff of the Provisional IRA, Seán Mac Stíofáin, was on hunger strike there at the time.

We need a way of addressing all these hurts. I would in no way want to place my family’s hurt in parallel with the grievous hurt of people who have lost family members and, worse, whose memories have been trampled upon, whose reputations have been traduced and who have been lied against for decades. That must come to an end.

Many thoughtful proposals examining processes that have worked to some degree internationally have been advanced. As an Oireachtas, perhaps we need to see whether we can build future agreement on a way to supplement the paragraphs in the Stormont House Agreement, that is, those dealing with the past, implementation and reconciliation.

Years do not diminish a family’s pain. In this regard, let us consider the individual families’ reactions after the vindication, decades later, of their reputation, having carried the burden of hurt for so long. To have final vindication is so important, redeeming and meaningful for the families. We really do have to struggle to find a way of achieving this appropriately for the many others touched upon by the Taoiseach in his speech and so many more who are struggling with the pain in silence right now. The denial of truth merely adds immeasurably to the great pain being endured. Therefore, while we heartily welcome the findings of the Ballymurphy inquiry and call on the British Government to fully react to it appropriately and properly, we need to bring the relief experienced by the Ballymurphy families to so many other families who are enduring great hurt.

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