This is understandably an emotional and difficult topic, and it is one that means a lot to me, having served as a Parliamentary Private Secretary to the former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, my right hon. Friend the Member for Great Yarmouth (Sir Brandon Lewis), and also having loved ones who lived through the troubles on either side of the border. The discussions were difficult and I want to give my support to the Secretary of State on this. If there is a threat of prosecution down the line, it will be the families of British soldiers and the families particularly in Unionist communities who will not get the answers they rightly deserve. It will disincentivise people from coming forward and presenting evidence.
Even though justice might not be served in a court, there will at least be answers to the questions that family members have been asking for a long time. It will offer some small hope of reconciliation for those families if they can finally get the truth about what happened and who was involved, in order to allow Northern Ireland to heal and move on. I have engaged regularly with members of the Northern Irish community, and they want to talk about education and about creating more high-skilled, high-wage jobs. They are desperate to see prosperity for their great country, and those are the things that that nation wants to move on to look forward to, rather than continuously looking backwards.