Thank you, Mr Evans.
I am not unaware of the Government’s aim. We absolutely need to move forward. We need to investigate processes to be used in proper form instead of the rewriting of history that currently sees us so badly abused, with Sinn Féin being the guilty party. We need our ex-service personnel to be allowed to retire without, at 75 years of age, being questioned about a case that they handled 45 years ago and asked to validate statements or investigations they carried out, and the pressure of that leading to illness. We need soldiers to be allowed to retire and not to be asked the exact wording of an order given to them 40 years previously when under fire and attempting to save their colleagues.
I understand the Government’s objective, but in the time that you have allocated to me, Mr Evans, I want to be very conscious of the victims. I did that at some length in the previous debate, as my hon. Friend the Member for Upper Bann (Carla Lockhart) said. For me, it is all about the victims and all about justice. My hon. Friend the Member for East Londonderry (Mr Campbell) referred to the flicker of light.
I hold on to that flicker of light that someday justice will come for the murderer of Lexie Cummings—he fled across the border. He has an on-the-run letter. He is a prominent Sinn Fein member, and he has not been held accountable for his misdoings or for the murder. Kenneth Smyth and Daniel McCormick were murdered on 10 December 1971, some 50 and a half years ago. Where is the justice for them when it comes to this Bill? I do not see that tonight either. I do not see justice for the four UDR men murdered in Ballydugan. Nine people were arrested, and only one person has ever been held accountable. I cannot see that justice.
6.45 pm
I do not see justice for Stuart Montgomery, a young police officer two weeks out of the college, who was murdered. It makes me angry to think about. I do not see the justice for the Irish Collie Club, who were at dinner in La Mon on 17 February 1978. My hon. Friend the Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson) will remember that very well. Where is the justice for those people? Where is the justice when it comes to making sure that my constituents can see that the people who carried out the murders and murder attempts are made accountable? I do not see that process. Where is the justice for those who were murdered at the Omagh bombing and the IRA men who carried that out? We need to have that justice in this system. We do not want a Bill brought forward that is clearly flawed, and that is what we have at the moment.
I say gently, but firmly to the Minister of State and to all Government Members that the legislation before us tonight does not give us any succour or comfort. I am a
very good friend of Raymond McCord, whose son was murdered by the UVF. He seeks justice, and he has not seen justice. I speak for Raymond McCord, who I know is watching this on TV, when I say that the legislation before us does not help that justice to happen either.
I stood at an RUC centenary event in Newtownards a number of weeks ago, and looked at the hundreds of retired RUC officers as we respected and remembered their sacrifice and the lives lost during the troubles. I listened to the rapturous applause that accompanied the remarks made by Stephen White OBE, chair of the RUC George Cross Foundation. He did not write a groundbreaking poem or a history of the RUC; he simply stated that it was time for the demonisation of the RUC to stop, for the systematic abuse of the system to end and for history to be factually accurate. The overwhelming majority of deaths in the troubles were carried out by terrorists—that is a fact. Now is the time for justice. My constituents who grieve and demand justice ask for that.
I very much support our service personnel wholeheartedly, but this Bill is not the way to approach this matter. I am asking the Minister, respectfully but firmly, as we all are on this side of the Committee, to return this Bill with a different approach that fulfils these aims. My constituents wish for accountability for all the perpetrators who carried out vile murders and think they may have got away with it. I want to see them getting justice in this world—I know as a Christian they will get their justice in the next world, and the fires of hell will burn them in eternal damnation, but that is just me speaking out about the way I want to see life for them. I want to see justice in this world.