The Letter that the Irish Times didn’t publish

Sent to Irish Times on November 14th, 2024

Mary Lou McDonald’s interview on the Free State Podcast, hosted by former Derry GAA player and pundit Joe Brolly and journalist Dion Fanning has been widely reported in the media, including Wednesday’s Irish Times. In the interview she is quoted as saying it’s ‘Not reasonable’ to ask Sinn Féin representatives about Troubles atrocities, especially if they were ‘a baby in the 1970s about things that happened in the 1970s’. As she was born in 1969 Ms McDonald is presumably granting this dispensation to herself. She adds that this ‘wouldn’t be reasonably done with somebody from Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil or the Labour Party’ and it was time for the ‘Free State establishment’ to ‘move on’.

By using such Civil War terminology, Ms McDonald seems to have difficulty in moving on herself. Her remarks also display a worrying lack of historical insight into past events.

The problem with her position is that in 1922 the British government introduced a general amnesty for all Troubles related offences in the War of Independence and in 1924 the Free State government did likewise for the Civil War. There have been no similar Acts of Oblivion for the more recent Troubles. Besides which, there are no members of the ‘Free State’ political parties alive who participated in these earlier conflicts, let alone the more recent Troubles on both sides of the Border.

In the absence of such measures there is no statute of limitation on murder or grievous bodily harm simply because these offences may have been related to pursuance of a political cause. Hence there are still many cases pending and investigations taking place into events that resulted in death or serious injury between 1969 and 1998. By the way, some of these acts of violence were committed by people born in the 1970s.

In campaigning for a Truth Recovery Process, we are proposing, as an alternative to the

courts, that victims and survivors should also be able to find out what happened through a

mediation process in which former combatants could provide information in good faith to

them. The process would be subject to verification under the joint auspices of appointed

representatives of the British and Irish governments, ideally subject to international oversight.

Given the continuing relevance of Legacy cases and the growing public awareness of the effects of intergenerational trauma, Mary Lou McDonald and her fellow members can hardly be surprised that they are still being asked about what happened during the more recent Troubles, especially by members of those generations who lived through them and by members of younger generations still affected by the long term consequences. Some Sinn Fein members can contribute more to such a Truth Recovery Process than any ‘Free State’ party.

Harry Donaghy, Northern Chair

John Green, Southern Chair

Padraig Yeates, Secretary