Debate contribution: Legacy: Holding the Irish Government to Account

Debate contribution by Mr Matthew O'Toole on 23 September 2025.

MLA

Mr Matthew O'Toole

Party at the time

Social Democratic and Labour Party

Date

23 September 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Legacy: Holding the Irish Government to Account

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5129292

Read the official Assembly record

Text

It has been said before but needs to be said again, and as often as possible, that the people who matter most in this discussion are not those in the Chamber but those who are victims of the Troubles, as well as their families. In everything that we say and do, we must think about them. We also have a responsibility to the society in which we live. Young people today and future generations will take on the leadership of this society in years to come. We have a responsibility to them not to pass on the poison of our conflict but, rather, to do as much as we possibly can to create a healthy and reconciled society. We are clearly failing at that task thus far. The amnesty proposals that the previous Tory Government put forward marked a nadir in the post-conflict period. The proposals —.

I will give way in one second. The proposals that have come from the UK and Irish Governments are as yet scant in detail. There has been progress made in some areas, but there are real concerns that need to be addressed, and I hope that they will be, in part through legislation and engagement with victims and survivors first and then with political parties. I have to say, however, based on the quality of debate in the Chamber, that some will wonder how productive that engagement will be. Legislation will come forward in Westminster, and it is right that there are parties that will actually be in the Chamber there to amend that legislation where necessary. I will continue with my points, but I will give way now for the purposes of debate.

Our party has a consistent record of opposing amnesties. I do not want the debate to be about political point-scoring, but I am clear about where my party has always stood on violence in this society, be it republican, loyalist or state violence. All three happened. Parties on all sides of the Chamber remain in denial about the violence from republicans, loyalists or the state, or, indeed, from the state in collusion with loyalists or through the state controlling senior republicans. We have no issue with being clear about our position. We have no problems with our record, and I do not want this to be about party political point-scoring. We have been clear, and we were so earlier in this year, when we had the debate on their role, that the Irish Government needed to do more to assure and do right by the victims of the Omagh bombing. As a nationalist party that believes in a new Ireland, we have never had any difficulty with saying that. We have always stood by the Omagh victims, and we stand by all those who need more information from the Irish Government about incidents that happened during the Troubles. We make no bones about that. We have also been clear in calling out what happened and in standing with victims, not just those of state-sponsored collusion by Britain but those who are unable to access justice because the British state continues to hide information from them, and it is hiding information from them. Bridie Brown is 87 years of age. She wants to achieve in her final years some level of truth and justice for her family. The British state is preventing her from getting that, because it will not disclose information that is germane to the murder of her husband. Those are clear facts. Just as we stand with the Omagh families, with the victims of Kingsmills, with Bridie Brown and her family and with the families of all the victims of our conflict, we will always call for a system that does right by all those people. That will be our approach, and it is the approach that we have always followed, as we deal with the new legacy proposals.

Yes, I will take a very brief intervention.

That is certainly true. The Brown family has behaved with extraordinary dignity and has been thwarted completely indefensibly at every turn. Let me say this: we will not be found wanting in our responsibility to challenge, where necessary, the Irish Government, and we are robust in challenging the British Government. We will test the new proposals, doing our job in the Chamber, at Westminster and everywhere else and speaking up for the values that we want to see. We want to see a reconciled society. I worry about the trivialisation of violence. I am worried about the minimisation and glamourisation of everything that happened. I worry about people minimising and glamourising the IRA campaign and about people turning up outside a courthouse wearing a Parachute Regiment beret when a man is on trial. I do not want to prejudice that trial, but we know that innocent people were mown down on the streets of Derry. A British Prime Minister stood up in the House of Commons and apologised for it, but people still see fit to turn up to a courthouse to somehow undermine the idea of justice for those who seek it over Bloody Sunday. In all those things, we need to be serious, but I fear that there is no seriousness in the Chamber today. I fear that there is a constant desire, 30 years on from the first ceasefires, to rub one another's nose in it. Nothing in a legal framework —

— stops clarity coming from the organisations that were responsible for the conflict.

We will call for consistency —

— and clarity for victims.

929 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 13:10 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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