Contribution
The peace process in Northern Ireland was hard-won, and tough compromises had to be accepted by all parties. The Good Friday agreement was never going to have the wholesale support of all, but it brought about an end to the horrendous violence. However, it did not include a mechanism for dealing with unresolved killings during the troubles—either by terrorists or by the security forces—and nor did it provide an amnesty for crimes that had not yet been prosecuted.
Let us also not forget that, according to data from the House of Commons Library, around 3,520 people lost their lives during the troubles. They included 1,441 British service personnel, 722 of whom died at the hands of paramilitaries. Three hundred RUC officers were killed, and 301 individual deaths were the responsibility of the British military. Of those, 121 were republican terrorists, 101 were loyalist terrorists, and the remainder were all civilians. We therefore have a duty to ensure that all legacy issues arising from the troubles are dealt with compassionately, diligently and legally.
The previous Government’s legacy Act has been found to be unlawful by both the High Court in Belfast and the Court of Appeal. The High Court found several provisions of that Act to be incompatible with the European convention on human rights, and it was therefore deemed unlawful. It also found that it was incompatible with article 2 of the Windsor framework and should therefore be disapplied. The Court of Appeal upheld this decision, and also found additional aspects of the legacy Act to be incompatible with the ECHR.
There are many separate elements of the Northern Ireland Troubles Bill, but I will keep my contribution to two specific areas: immunity from prosecution for historical crimes, and the concerns of my fellow veterans moving forward under the new legislation. As a veteran, I have never sought or agreed that, as a British serviceman, I should ever be permitted immunity from prosecution for my actions during service. We work within the law of armed conflict, the Geneva convention and the laws of the United Kingdom when serving here, to name but three. We are trained to undertake operations within strict legal protocols, whatever the provocation we are experiencing or the hostile environment we are in.
There has been much opposition to the immunity offered within the legacy Act. The three veterans commissioners in July said:
“This is not a call for immunity from the law, but for fairness under it”.
Ben Wallace, the former Defence Secretary, said that the British Army is “not above the law.” Brigadier John Donnelly, who served in Northern Ireland and is now chair of the Centre for Military Justice, said only last week:
“You cannot have a system of law that applies to some groups and not to others. It is vital that soldiers operating in support of the civil powers are held fully accountable to the laws they are required to enforce. That is the difference between the soldier and the terrorist.”
We must also understand that it is not just British service personnel who were granted immunity from prosecution under the previous legislation; it was also terrorists who murdered civilians and British servicemen and servicewomen. More than 200 investigations into deaths of Operation Banner soldiers were shut down upon the enactment of the legacy Act, against the wishes of those soldiers’ families.
Immunity from prosecution is dangerous, because it invalidates the justice system, sacrifices victims’ rights, weakens deterrence, violates international law and undermines long-term peace and trust in our institutions. I will never agree that immunity is the appropriate solution. It sets an awful precedent. If it were to be implemented by foreign Governments currently in military conflicts, we would be rightly appalled.