Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
LAST UPDATE | 28 Feb 2024
PROVISIONS FOR CONDITIONAL immunity from prosecution for Troubles offences in the UK government’s Legacy Act are not compatible with human rights legislation, a judge has ruled.
Delivering a judgment at Belfast High Court, Justice Adrian Colton said there was no evidence the immunity provision would in any way contribute to reconciliation in Northern Ireland.
The Legacy Act received royal assent in September despite widespread opposition from political parties, victims’ organisations in Northern Ireland and the Irish government.
Aspects of the laws include a limited form of immunity from prosecution for Troubles-related offences for those who co-operate with the new Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery (ICRIR).
The new Act will also halt future civil cases and legacy inquests.
A number of Troubles victims had taken the legal action challenging the human rights compliance of the Government’s Act.
Justice Colton told the court: “I am satisfied that the immunity from prosecution provisions under section 19 of the Act are in breach of the lead applicant’s rights pursuant to Article 2 of the ECHR (European Convention on Human Rights).
“I am also satisfied they are in breach of Article 3 of the ECHR.”
He added: “There is no evidence that the granting of immunity under the Act will in any way contribute to reconciliation in Northern Ireland, indeed the evidence is to the contrary.”
The judge is continuing to deliver his judgment.
Multiple victims launched the judicial review proceedings against the Act. Martina Dillon, John McEvoy and Lynda McManus were selected as the lead cases in the legal battle at the High Court in Belfast.
Martina Dillon’s 45-year-old husband, Seamus, was shot dead in a loyalist attack at the Glengannon Hotel in Dungannon, County Tyrone, in 1997.
John McEvoy survived a loyalist shooting on the Thierafurth Inn in Kilcoo, County Down, in 1992.
Lynda McManus’s father, James, was among those wounded in the Sean Graham bookmakers massacre in 1992.
When the case was heard last year, a barrister said the Act was subjecting victims to a form of “secondary trauma”.
The SDLP welcomed the ruling today, saying that the British Government had put the interests of soldiers and paramilitaries above the needs of victims and survivors.
MP Colum Eastwood said the decision marked “an important moment for victims and survivors who have been resolutely opposed to the approach taken by the British Government”.
“No political party in Northern Ireland supports the British Government’s attempt to shut down truth, justice and accountability for victims and survivors,” he said.
Separately, the Irish Government has launched an interstate legal case against the Legacy Act, arguing that it breaches the European Convention on Human Rights.
Good stuff
Brilliant news.
The Brits trying to keep their dirty deeds hidden from public view. Are they ever not at it?
@Anthony Curran: They certainly had no monopoly on dirty deeds. Will we see SF pay compensation to relatives of those bereaved by the Republican Movement?
@Brendan O’Brien: pay compensation to those bereaved by the Republican Movement, I mean … not at my sharpest today.
@Brendan O’Brien: @Brendan O’Brien: Were the Nationalist community supposed to lie down and just take the abuses – including murder – meted out by the Brits, Brendan?
Serious question.
What would you have done on the circumstances?
Dare we suggest that you too would have become a member.
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: But most people in the nationalist community did not become members (the SDLP was far more popular), and many in the nationalist community were intimidated, assaulted, maimed or murdered by the Provisional IRA.
John Hume said that the Provisional IRA’s attitude ‘has all the hallmarks of undiluted fascism … They have also the other hallmark of the fascist – the scapegoat – the · Brits are to blame for everything, even their own atrocities! They know better than the rest of us. They know so much better that they take unto themselves the right, without consultation with anyone, to dispense death and destruction. By destroying Ireland’s people, they destroy Ireland.’
@Jack Moss: The Loyalist and later British attacks on the civil rights movement was what led to the resurgence in the IRA.
The British security forces were the best recruiters the IRA had.
@Brendan O’Brien: Wow!
Imagine the leader of a group criticising another.
Whatever next!
And none of that alters that you – too – could well have been a member had you the experiences of victims of Loyalist and British terrorism.
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: John Hume is a byword for dignity and gravitas, and did more for the nationalist community in Northern Ireland than anyone else, as is widely recognised in Ireland and elsewhere. He was a decent and honourable man, unlike the grubby terrorists he criticised. He knew what he was talking about. He walked the walk.
An outbreak of nationalist violence was understandable in the context of 1969–71. The fact that a futile 30-year ‘armed struggle’ followed was not inevitable, though, and certainly was not justified.
You claimed the other day that IRA violence forced the British Army out of Northern Ireland, when the reality was the opposite – IRA violence kept the British Army in Northern Ireland.
Why no news coverage on what happened in Celbridge recently. Complete media blackout
@Tom L: Nothing happened….
About time fantastic news
Welcome news, and a timely reminder that Adams and O’Broin supported immunity for all involved.
I imagine, though, that such an outcome would already have been anticipated and that appeals to the Court of Appeal in Belfast and the U.K. Supreme Court would already have been prepared well in advance…
For once I agree.
have your say