CONSERVATIVE
New Forest East

NIO – NORTHERN IRELAND TROUBLES (LEGACY AND RECONCILIATION) BILL - 18 July 2023

NIO – NORTHERN IRELAND TROUBLES (LEGACY AND RECONCILIATION) BILL - 18 July 2023

Sir Julian Lewis: The Secretary of State will be aware that it was back in April 2017 that the then Defence Committee first recommended drawing a line with a statute of limitations coupled with a truth recovery process. We recognised that the process had to be for everyone or for no one. Does he accept that there is a risk of having overcomplicated the process, and is any remedy likely to be available if, in putting this into practice, it is found that service personnel are not being sufficiently protected for ongoing prosecutions?

[The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Chris Heaton-Harris): There is obviously no statute of limitations. The Bill has moved on and, as I said, I would like to think it has been improved a great deal. But it will be an independent body that allows for these things to happen. That is vital both in dealing with the issues of the past, as my right hon. Friend outlined, and in helping all victims perhaps to get some information about the circumstances by which they lost loved ones or others.]