Debate contribution: Soldier F: Not Guilty Verdict
Debate contribution by Mr Jon Burrows on .
- MLA
- Mr Jon Burrows
- Party at the time
- Ulster Unionist Party
- Date
- 3 November 2025
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Matters of the Day
- Heading
- Soldier F: Not Guilty Verdict
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5212732
Read the official Assembly record
Text
Bloody Sunday was an awful day for the people of Londonderry, and it was not a proud day for the British Army. Two things can, however, be wrong at the same time. Bloody Sunday was wrong — it was a catastrophic error by the British Army — but it was also wrong to prosecute Soldier F. That reflects the imbalance that is at the heart of how we deal with legacy in Northern Ireland. There is an imbalance in the prosecutions taken, the media reporting, the money spent and the condemnation expressed. I was proud to stand in Guildhall Square on 15 June 2010 — there were only about three police officers there — when the Bloody Sunday families got to read the report. On the screen live was David Cameron, our Prime Minister at the time, and he said that Bloody Sunday was "unjustified and unjustifiable". That is the difference between the British state and republicans, who still say that what they did was necessary and noble and who still celebrate their patriot dead. That is the cancer that is at the heart of our politics and that creates so much divisiveness and polarisation. They should reflect today on the fact that, while our Prime Minister was able to say that Bloody Sunday was unjustified and unjustifiable, their leaders continue to stand and give orations about those who murdered people in cold blood, not in the heat of the battle but in actions that were planned; they sneaked under people's cars and planted bombs. One of their former leaders, Martina Anderson, planted bombs all across England and then went to Scotland and lay in a flat while she knew that they were ticking down. When she was interviewed and told, "It is not too late. Can you tell us where they are?", she did not, knowing that the bombs were planted in hotels in London. As someone whose family served at Sword Beach and the Somme and whose father served for the entire Troubles, I can say that Bloody Sunday was wrong. The British Army acted wrongly, but the prosecution of Soldier F was wrong. There was no evidence. That is the invisible hand of the PPS, which takes the path of least resistance. Turning a blind eye to anything that would rock the boat is a culture that emanated from the peace process. That is why there are people who are not prosecuted when there is evidence, and people who are prosecuted when there is no evidence. We still live under the shadow of a guillotine, which is the threat of Sinn Féin. I stand in solidarity with the families of Bloody Sunday. It was an awful day. I also stand with the thousands of victims of loyalist and republican terrorists who do not get the same voice. We, in this party, speak for all victims — innocent victims, even if the Alliance Party struggles with that terminology.
490 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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