While a few MPs have had to sit through a few hours of debate about this issue, many victims have had to sit through decades of trying to comfort their loved ones after what happened to them. Only last week, we saw victims in Derry achieving a modicum of truth through the inquest process. That victim, Kathleen Thompson—a mother of six—was murdered in 1971. Those victims and families got some truth last week through the current system, as imperfect as it is.
What we are doing today is utterly shameful. It is a whitewash on a grand scale. It is an opportunity for impunity and would not be allowed to stand in any other part of the United Kingdom. It says an awful lot about the state of this state that we are quietly and coldly walking through the Lobbies to bring this about today. I, for one, will never support immunity for the soldier who murdered 12-year-old Majella O’Hare—shot her on her way to chapel. Equally, I will never support immunity for the IRA team who blew up Patsy Gillespie and killed five soldiers in the city of Derry in the early ’90s. That is what we are doing.
Somebody has to tell people what is happening. The way this Government have voted today has given a licence for impunity for what happened in our part of the world over many decades. If anybody really believes that this legislation will bring about truth or reconciliation, they are lying to themselves and to the victims out there, who are deeply, deeply disappointed and dismayed today. I will absolutely vote against Third Reading.
9.14 pm