Eastwood angrily denounces ‘legacy bill’ as ‘affront to democracy’ and urges Ireland to take Britain to Strasbourg over human rights

Transcript

00:00 There are a lot of things that get me angry in this job and this has got me more angry than

00:05 anything I have ever had to deal with because unlike some people in this house, the people

00:11 sitting on these benches have had to deal with and get to know and work with the victims of our

00:18 terrible past for decades and I am frankly embarrassed today. I don't know what I'm going

00:26 to say to them when I speak to them after this debate because as a whole, as a body politic,

00:33 we have failed them. We have a peace process, we have peace, lots of us have been able to move on

00:39 but we have left a very significant cohort of people behind and we're rubber stamping that

00:45 today and some people will walk through these lobbies coldly tonight without having the names

00:52 of the victims ringing in their heads. I have the names going around my head right now. I put many

00:58 of them on the public record in this chamber over the passage of this bill. I am deeply ashamed,

01:05 deeply ashamed that we are doing this today. There's a pretense in the proposal for this bill

01:13 that somehow the British government were not an actor at all in the conflict in Northern Ireland.

01:20 That is patently untrue. They're coming in to talk to the local political parties in Northern

01:27 Ireland who are just squabbling. They can't come up with any answers, they can't deal with this

01:30 problem. Patently untrue. We came up with the answer. It was storming the house. The reason

01:37 it wasn't delivered was because of the British government dragging their feet and then changing

01:41 their policy after new decade, new approach. That is a fact. I really hope now that the Irish

01:49 government listen to the calls from some of us to take this government to court in Strasbourg at

01:56 the European Court of Human Rights. Because this is an affront to human rights, it's an affront to

02:01 Article 2. Every single expert I've spoken to agrees with me on that. Every single victim agrees

02:08 with me on that as well. The Secretary of State must have used the phrase "effective information

02:13 recovery process" a lot of times. Effective information recovery process. I can take you

02:20 to families today whose children were shot in the troubles, 14 and 15 years old, and their cases

02:29 have been closed by this government until 2064 and 65. These are the people telling us they want an

02:36 effective information recovery process. They're denying victims an effective information recovery.

02:43 That is what they're doing. So it tells me that this is based on a lie. This is an attempt by

02:49 this government and dark forces within the security apparatus of this government to close down access

02:54 to truth and justice. We all understand that justice is going to be hard to get for many

03:00 families. But most of those families haven't even had any truth. The process of investigation gets

03:06 them truth. I can take you to loads of families today who never even once met a police officer,

03:11 even though a loved one was murdered. Does anybody here believe that the IRA are going to come

03:17 forward and tell us who bombed a particular pub or who shot a particular person? It is utter

03:24 nonsense. This is an attempt to close down access to the truth. It is an affront to democracy.

03:30 Immunity is impunity. You have given people a licence to murder people on the streets of Derry

03:36 and Belfast and Newry and right across Northern Ireland, and also on the streets of London.

03:40 I do not understand how any politician can stand and look at the faces of crying victims and tell

03:47 them this is the right thing to do. I'm ashamed that this is happening today. But let me say one

03:51 thing to end. I know these people who've had to struggle for decade after decade after decade.

03:57 this will not be the end for them and we will be with them in support right till the end.