Legal challenges by a number of victims and families to the new Northern Ireland Legacy Bill commenced this week in Belfast.  The Irish Government may litigate against the UK in the coming weeks. Prof Kieran McEvoy discusses the legal advantages of an interstate challenge versus individual cases taken by families.

The Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023 addresses the legacy of the Northern Ireland Troubles and promotes reconciliation by establishing an Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery, limiting criminal investigations, legal proceedings, inquests and police complaints, extending the prisoner release scheme in the Northern Ireland (Sentences) Act 1998, and providing for experiences to be recorded and preserved and for events to be studied and memorialised, and to provide for the validity of interim custody orders.

This legislation ends all Troubles-related criminal investigations, civil remedies, inquests and Police Ombudsman investigations, and replaces them with a new Independent Commission on Reconciliation and Information Recovery. The Commission will have the power to review serious Troubles-related offences, to offer conditional immunity for those offences, and to make recommendations on oral history and memorialisation.

The legislation is opposed by victims and families, all Northern Ireland political parties and the Irish Government.

Legal challenges taken by a number of families commenced this week in the Belfast High Court. 

The Irish Government has sought legal advice and will make a decision in the coming weeks on whether they will litigate against the UK Government.

Individual and interstate challenges can run in parallel.

In his latest article in the Irish Times, Prof Kieran McEvoy discusses the legal advantages of an interstate challenge versus individual cases taken by families.

Read more here.