Troubles legacy rules an ‘affront to justice’

New Troubles legacy rules, which take effect today in Northern Ireland and prevent access to the courts, are a “complete affront to justice”, a civil rights body has said.

Amnesty International described the move to end all current legacy investigations and inquests as a “cliff edge for truth”.

Northern Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris welcomed the coming into force of the new arrangements.

“In establishing the independent commission, we are doing something that has eluded successive Governments since 1998,” he said.

“That is, delivering robust and effective mechanisms for addressing the legacy of the past, and providing more information and answers to families.”

Under a guillotine imposed by the UK Legacy Act people will no longer have access to the courts for cases related to the Troubles.

There will be no new civil cases, no police ombudsman legacy investigations and no further PSNI investigations into legacy killings.

Instead, all cases will move into a new commission established under the UK legislation.

The Independent Commission on Reconciliation and Information Recovery will offer families who approach it, a narrative account of what happened to their loved ones.

There is the possibility of criminal investigations where sufficient evidence can be found.

But critics claim the move to end access to the courts is a cynical one by the British authorities to prevent prosecution of its army veterans and limit the costs of legacy litigation.

Amnesty International said the government should be ashamed of the approach it had taken.

“The Troubles Act first of May guillotine for judicial processes has acted as an incentive for the State to frustrate legal proceedings and continue to grossly fail victims,” said its Northern Ireland deputy director Gráinne Teggart.

She said people were determined it would not be allowed to stand.

The act is already being challenged by the Irish Government in the European Court of Human Rights.

Frustration at move

Families have expressed frustration at the approach taken by the UK government.

The family of Paul Topper Thompson, shot dead by loyalists in 1994, have seen the UK government go to court to prevent the release of sensitive information at his inquest.

It ultimately failed, but delays caused by the challenges meant the inquest ran out of time and could not be concluded before today’s deadline.

Mr Thompson’s brother Eugene has vowed to continue his fight to establish the background to his brother’s murder.

“I’ve been doing this for 30 years and all of a sudden they’re going to say to me, we’re just going to draw a line under 30 years of your life,” he said.

“My mother died doing this and it’s unacceptable what they’re doing. They’ve dragged it out and dragged it out for 30 years.”

Peter Sheridan, a former senior policeman is now a leading figure in the ICRIR.

He accepts that people are cynical about the new structures but hopes to win them around by successfully answering questions some families have about the murder of their loved ones.

“I think the only way that I’ll be able to change that is by results, outcomes for families and survivors who come to us.

“I’ll do my best to recover whatever information they require, that helps them deal with that past.”

‘Innocent victims not going to get justice’

Mary McCurrie says she will engage with the new commission, but does not have any confidence it will deliver for her.

Her father Jimmy McCurrie was shot dead along with another man by the IRA in east Belfast in June 1970.

Many others were wounded in a night of violence around St Matthew’s Church in the Short Strand where the IRA had taken up positions.

She rejects accounts of a gun battle in the area at the time her father was murdered. She says he was hit hours beforehand.

She says there’s no incentive for former paramilitaries to tell the truth about what they did.

“The IRA is never, never, never going to admit what they did, what they started,” she said.

“Innocent victims – I hate this word victims – but we’re not going to get justice.

“But we’re the gift that keeps on giving because now we have another inquiry team set up, all on film star wages, all on the backs of what we went through.

“So no, we’re never going to get justice. And all those perpetrators , all those IRA gunmen when they die, that’s the only justice they will face.

“And it’ll not be in this world. It’ll be in the next.”