DUP LEADER Peter Robinson has dismissed the Eames-Bradley proposals for addressing the past and accused Lord Eames and Denis Bradley and other members of their group of engaging in an exercise in moral equivalence and ambivalence.
Mr Robinson said yesterday that Northern secretary Shaun Woodward must not attempt to implement the report of the Consultative Group on the Past headed by former Church of Ireland primate Lord Eames and former Policing Board vice-chairman Denis Bradley.
The Eames-Bradley report sets out a road map for dealing with the past that includes proposals to deal with reconciliation, truth and forgiveness. Mr Woodward has already rejected its most controversial proposal for a £12,000 payment to the bereaved relatives of the troubles.
Mr Robinson issued his party response yesterday, which he wrote himself. He said he rejected the report and reaffirmed his party’s position that there can be no “moral or legal equivalence between innocent victims of violence and the criminal terrorists responsible for creating so many victims in Northern Ireland”.
He said the “most reprehensible” recommendation of Eames-Bradley Group was the proposed £12,000 recognition payment.
“The belief that innocent victims could be bought in this way was bad enough, but the error was compounded on a massive scale when it was revealed that the families of dead terrorists would be included in their proposed scheme. Herein lies one of the most fundamental flaws in the approach adopted by the group, which is apparent throughout their report – the drawing of no moral distinction between the innocent and the guilty,” said Mr Robinson.
“The DUP is continuing to work towards a definition of a victim which is not morally ambivalent or invites private interpretation or spin. The authors ask the rest of us to deny what we know and hold to be true, and instead collude in an exercise of moral equivalence, not to say moral ambivalence. That we will not do and cannot support,” said Mr Robinson. Citing a number of IRA actions, Mr Robinson said the DUP made no apology for highlighting the clear difference between the innocent and the guilty in Northern Ireland.
“Innocent victims who lost their lives in countless horrific incidents during the Troubles such as at Enniskillen or in the La Mon bombing bear no relation whatsoever with the terrorists intercepted by the legitimate forces of law and order at Loughgall or the likes of the Shankill bomber who was killed himself while murdering and maiming innocent civilians,” he said.
Mr Robinson said, “Over recent times it has become fashionable in some quarters to pretend otherwise. That is wrong. We shall continue to deliver for innocent victims in government and ensure they get the due recognition they deserve. As for this report, we will resist it every step of the way.”
In the report itself Mr Robinson said he made no claim to superior moral ground but equally he felt no need to concede such terrain to Lord Eames and Mr Bradley.
In an apparent reference to continuing debates over how the Troubles started – a response to unionist discrimination or a republican “insurrection” or attempt to achieve a united Ireland – he said: “In the imperfect world we inhabit . . . it seems to me entirely possible to celebrate the peace that all sides have accomplished while resisting the idea that we can or even need agree why we came into conflict in the first place.”
