Violet-Anne Wynne (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Tóibín for inviting me to cosponsor this important legislation. As members of the Joint Committee on the Implementation of the Good Friday Agreement, the area of legacy issues is of particular interest to us and we are deeply and rightly concerned in that regard. As he outlined, Ireland is a co-equal guarantor of the Good Friday Agreement and its negotiated and agreed principles that brought peace on this island, peace that we have protected for 25 years. That enduring peace must be protected and nurtured at all costs. The British legacy Bill seeks to end that harmony and to root division. It seeks to silence the victims and their families, some of whom our committee met in this term, and it seeks to tear up the Stormont House Agreement. It has been opposed by political leaders in the North, victims' families, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Council of Europe and the Westminster Joint Committee on Human Rights. Most recently, the amnesty provision was voted down by the House of Lords. If the British Government insists on pushing these amnesty provisions, we must be brave enough to take it on under Article 33. The Bill before the House serves to do simply that and I am proud to support it.

See this speech in context