Young
Unionists

I am sad, but not shocked, at the leaked details of what is being proposed by the Eames-Bradley Consultative Group on the past. It has been reported by the BBC and covered by Pete Baker on Slugger O’Toole that the group is pushing for £12,000 to be paid to the family of anyone killed during the troubles; whether they were part of a terrorist organisation perpetrating murderous acts does not appear to matter to those serving in this consultative group. Eames-Bradley are forwarding the policy that there is “no hierarchy of victims” that has some common threads with the Sinn Fein policy that attempts to equate the Provisional IRA with the victims of it’s 30+ years of terror. Not only is this a complete and utter reprehensible position, but it disgraces the memory of those who lost their lives during the the course of the troubles. Obviously my position on Eames-Bradley, at the minute, is pretty clear. I am sceptical of what their agenda is and cynical of what positive outcomes they foresee from taking this course of action.

There are unionist groups out there whose own recommendations come close to Eames-Bradley in terms of the need and benefit such truth recovery mechanisms can provide to Northern Ireland. Mainstream unionist parties (DUP, UUP and TUV) would not touch this with the proverbial 40ft barge pole. There is not a uniform category of victims, they are diverse and wide ranging and should be treated as individuals. I have been watching the Eames-Bradley group with much interest and I fear there will be some headline grabbing and positioning going on, not by the group itself, but by the ones pulling the strings. This is unsavory and unwelcome. Jim Nicholson MEP has had this to say:

“The suggestion from Eames-Bradley that £12,000 compensation is given to all those killed in the Troubles – including terrorists – is a highly damaging, immoral proposal, that will undermine both community relations and political confidence.

“The proposal endorses the morally flawed notion that a terrorist killed while undertaking a mission of murder has the same status as an innocent civilian murdered in a bomb attack or a member of the security forces murdered in front of their family. People across our entire community will find this suggestion repugnant.

“The Government must understand in the clearest possible terms that this proposal is totally unacceptable”.

Imagine if it was suggested that the Al Quaeda suicide bombers who crashed the abducted planes into the World Trade Center in New York on September 11th 2001 were to be classified as victims on an equal footing with those 2,974 people whom they murdered? There would be outrage, and rightly so.

Northern Ireland has moved along way from the pre-ceasfire days, through the negotiations that cumulated on the Belfast Agreement, the incomplete decommissioning, St. Andrew’s Agreement and the restoration of devolution in 2007. There is still a long way to go, and still a lot of heavy lifting to be done.

Reflecting back on the year that was 2008 there have been many historic moments that will impact on the international stage: from Morgan Tsvangirai’s victory in Zimbabwe to Barack Obama’s in the USA; from Russian intervention in South Ossetia to the humanitarian crisis now in Zimbabwe; and of course the global economic meltdown. Closer to home the political situation in Northern Ireland has taken a back burner in terms of international headlines, with the Northern Ireland Assembly having to actually demonstrate its competence in governing this region of the UK. It is debatable as to the extent of success it has had, but there are certainly issues that need to be resolved that fall with the remit of “peace processing” as opposed to devolved institutions.

The most pressing and reoccurring of issues is that of legacies of the past. Currently we have the Eames-Bradley consultative group on the past, an Historical Enquiries Team, high profile cases over the deaths of Pat Finucane, Rosemary Nelson, Robert Hamill and Billy Wright and a Police Ombudsman that has ruled over allegations of collusion within the police service. The Bloody Sunday enquiry alone has cost £182 million to date with no results and delay after delay. It is a delicate operation in dealing with atrocities than have happened during the ‘troubles’ due to the human cost and also considering we have convicted terrorists at the heart of the government of Northern Ireland who directed and participated in the death-dealing. The issue of the ‘disappeared’ has long been a shadow over Sinn Fein’s commitment to truth and reconciliation.

2009 will be a year where I think the Eames-Bradley consultative group on the past will be the one to watch. Their remit and their conclusions may well shape how the British and Irish governments wish to deal with the legacies of the past. Nationalist politicians from John Hume to Gerry Adams have attempted to construct a narrative in which to compare Northern Ireland to South Africa, and portray the nationalist community as the ever-suffering underclass. But it is the South African Truth Recovery Commission that has been focused on as some kind of existing model of which to base one specific to Northern Ireland on. The media hyperbole over the concept of perpetrators meeting the victims of their action was spun as some great participatory success. The South African model was flawed as it did not deliver the truth and it did not deliver justice. In a hypothetical situation a model for the troubles would have to have complete buy-in by not just the two governments (British and Irish) but by all the paramilitaries groups involved. I do not foresee any honesty from the paramilitary groups, and Gerry Adams’ continuing denial that he was ever even a member of the Provisional IRA should be treated with the contempt it deserves (although it does demonstrate the two-faces of Sinn Fein).

In terms of gaining some truth, knowledge and understanding of the ordeal the people of Northern Ireland went through we have been dependent on the British government going through the motions in terms of the Saville Inquiry and opening up its archives – and as they are the only active participants they are the ones under intense scrutiny.

The old clichés about a shared future and reconciliation are indeed the goal to which we should all be aiming towards, but frankly we are not there yet. There has been no movement from the loyalist paramilitaries to decommission their weapons; we have witnessed RPG attacks on the PSNI where old stocks of PIRA semtex has been used; and we have a system of government that, at it’s heart, lacks the ability to be held to account. No-one should be getting ahead of themselves, we are still peace-processing and have a long way to go for “normal” politics to prevail.