Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
MR TOM
ROBERTS AND
MR WILLIAM
SMITH
2 FEBRUARY 2005
Q1 Chairman: Good afternoon, may I apologise
again for the shambles of last week.
Mr Roberts: We were not involved.
Mr Smith: We heard about it.
Q2 Chairman: I have no doubt everybody
has heard about it—I never said you were responsible. Sometimes
the wheels of democracy do not run that smoothly. As you know,
we are looking at whether or not to recommend that we go down
the path of some sort of reconciliation inquiry to deal with the
past. We have not by any means decided that we will recommend
to do this, but we just thought it was a subject, since the Government
is thinking about it, that we ought to take a look at from a different
perspective, if you like. That is what we are about and we are
very grateful to you both for coming to give evidence. I took
the decision, with the Committee's agreement, that we would conduct
all of the hearings dealing with victims of one sort or another
in private, partly because I thought people might feel more free
to talk—although of course the evidence will eventually
be made public—but also because it occurred to me that one
or two people might want to make some sort of statement, if they
thought the television cameras were on them, which would not be
altogether helpful. Perhaps you could start by telling us a bit
about what the main objectives of your organisation are, what
support you provide to the families of loyalist ex-prisoners and
how your work, if it has, has extended beyond ex-prisoners and
their families.
Mr Roberts: I will open on that.
EPIC was set up really in the late Eighties/early 1990s when large
numbers of prisoners began to be released; these were people who
had been imprisoned during the Seventies and it became apparent
that they were experiencing difficulties for a whole host of reasons.
Our organisation was set up to look at the problems associated
with a certain constituency of those prisoners, namely ones with
a Ulster Volunteer Force or Red Hand Commando background. We dealt
with all the obvious things that prisoners would experience when
they get out, people who have been away for quite a long time,
perhaps their relationships have broken up, their parents were
dead or if they were not married or in a relationship, they found
difficulties around housing, accessing welfare rights, so we would
have provided a lot of care for them in that respect, and also
pointed them in the direction of training, hopefully with the
objective of getting into fulltime employment again. Those types
of things went on for quite a number of years and we also lobbied
around all the legislative barriers that exist to prevent ex-prisoners
accessing employment and other services. As I say, that type of
thing went on for quite a number of years and then after the Good
Friday or Belfast Agreement, whichever you call it, the vast majority
of prisoners were released about 2000, and after that our work
began to change. Along the way as well we created opportunities
for ex-prisoners to become involved in peace-building activities,
and we would like to think that ex-prisoners have played a role
in achieving ceasefires etc and moving us on to a more peaceful
scenario.
Q3 Chairman: Prior to 2000, I think you
said, you were just dealing with those prisoners who had come
to the end of their time and were being released.
Mr Roberts: Those who had been
released by the normal mechanisms.
Q4 Chairman: Through having served their
sentences.
Mr Roberts: Yes.
Q5 Chairman: At what sort of rate were
they coming to you or were you approaching them, what sort of
numbers are we talking about before the main thrust of people
who all came out as a result of Good Friday?
Mr Roberts: The first life sentence
prisoners began to be released about the late 1980s and there
was a considerable number released then, in the late Eighties
and early Nineties.
Q6 Chairman: You say a considerable number,
can you help us: 50, 60?
Mr Roberts: It varied, it is very
difficult to put a figure on it. We would have prisoners who would
have been released in the Seventies who had not access to our
services and we would have people coming who had been released
from prison maybe 10 or 12 years and who were still experiencing
problems.
Q7 Chairman: How many people did you
have on your books before the main influx?
Mr Smith: The estimate is that
there were 15,000 loyalist ex-prisoners over 30 years of the conflict.
Q8 Chairman: 15,000?
Mr Smith: Yes, we are talking
about 30 years of conflict here. It is estimated that we would
probably have represented half of those people and the UDAM represented
the other half. 95% of those people did not benefit out of the
Belfast Agreement, the vast majority of ex-prisoners served their
full sentences, there was only something like 200 to 300 prisoners
released under the Good Friday Agreement.
Q9 Chairman: What are your main methods
of support for the families in particular of the loyalist ex-prisoners?
Mr Roberts: We provide a welfare
rights service, we provide direct counselling services for those
prisoners who are experiencing emotional difficulties, but the
main thrust of our work has been to try to influence those agencies
who have an input into the legislation that affects ex-prisoners
from regaining their full citizenship if you like.
Q10 Chairman: Has your work extended
beyond the ex-prisoners and their families?
Mr Roberts: Very much so. We have
tried to create opportunities where ex-prisoners can engage with
adversaries from the other side of the community, with a view
to building an understanding in the hope that we will never return
to the violent confrontations that we have had in the past.
Q11 Chairman: How, from your perspective,
has the British Government performed in meeting its commitments
to the reintegration of ex-prisoners contained in the Belfast
Agreement?
Mr Smith: Under the Belfast Agreement
both the Irish Government and the British Government agreed to
help and assist in the reintegration of ex-prisoners in their
communities; they have both failed in that. For instance, the
discriminatory legislation against them is still there and ex-prisoners
cannot get a taxi licence and drive taxis because they are ex-prisoners.
They are not entitled to compensation because they are ex-prisoners,
even though they are out of prison. For instance, next week we
will be representing an ex-prisoner in a compensation claim because
he has been denied compensation. He was assaulted in Banbridge
last year by a crowd of people and put in intensive care. He applied
for compensation as any normal person would do, but he has been
denied it because he is an ex-prisoner. So the Governments need
to change the legislation, prisoners are not asking for anything
more than ordinary people, we are asking for a level playing field.
Q12 Chairman: What are the major current
issues as you see it for ex-prisoners and their families?
Mr Roberts: The major thing as
I see it is you have got political parties and I think the Government
is quite rightly calling for paramilitarism to be consigned to
history if you like. We would say that if ex-prisoners are given
the opportunity, in my view the majority of former paramilitary
activists would have served a prison sentence of some sort over
the course of the conflict, so if these people are not given the
opportunity to resume a normal life with a normal access to employment,
then it gives some sort of excuse perhaps for some of the nefarious
activity that exists. We believe that if the Governments are serious
they need to create a road where people who, if they were principled
in the stand that they took as regards paramilitarism, let them
walk up this road and let other mechanisms deal with those who
want to indulge in this nefarious activity that I am talking about.
Q13 Chairman: I think you used the phrase
"normal access to employment", how do they not have
normal access?
Mr Roberts: If I could use myself
as an example as a former prisoner who had a reasonably good career
before I went into prison, I thought I had enhanced my prospects
of employment by gaining an honours degree when I was in prison,
but it did not make any difference and all the avenues for employment
were blocked that would have enabled me to put the degree that
I gained to good use.
Q14 Chairman: They were blocked for you
because you had been in prison.
Mr Roberts: Yes. For instance,
I was employed by Post Office Telephones, now British Telecom,
but that career was blocked to me when I came out of prison, even
though I had enhanced my educational achievement while in prison.
I am just using myself as an example, that is not untypical.
Q15 Chairman: There is no better example
than one's personal experience. Why do you think reintegration
is important to reconciliation?
Mr Roberts: If you are going to
marginalise a particular constituency within the community then
to me it is a recipe for resentment and perhaps more trouble down
the road.
Chairman: Thank you. The Reverend Martin
Smyth.
Q16 Reverend Smyth: Can I just go back
on this question of the law and prisoners? Am I right in saying
that that law is just dealing with those who were convicted of
terrorist offences, it is not dealing with all prisoners, and
as a result if a person who is out living a normal life now happened
to be attacked or involved in some incident, he could not claim
compensation because he was imprisoned at an earlier stage for
terrorist offences. I contrast two people that I am thinking of,
out together, and one had a minor injury, the other became quadriplegic.
The one with the minor injury got compensation because he had
not been in prison as a terrorist, whereas the other one, although
living a normal life and having broken with terrorism, has not
got compensation. Is that what you are actually saying?
Mr Smith: The guy I was talking
about was convicted of throwing a petrol bomb when he was 16 years
of age, he was not convicted of a terrorist offence, yet he was
refused compensation.
Q17 Chairman: When you say not of a terrorist
offence, these are the scheduled offences.
Mr Smith: Yes.
Q18 Chairman: Throwing a petrol bomb,
is that not a scheduled offence?
Mr Smith: It is a scheduled offence,
it is not a terrorist offence.
Q19 Chairman: What is the difference?
Mr Smith: He was not a paramilitary,
it was an individual act.
Mr Roberts: The case that you
are referring to I am pretty well aware of, and it seems to me
it is a very unjust case. The guy had been released for I think
15 or 16 years, married with children and had moved on and he
was just shot in a random sectarian shooting—not even a
sectarian shooting, I think it was a doorman who was under threat,
they wanted to shoot the doorman but he was caught walking past
and he finished up paraplegic and he has been denied compensation.
It seems to me very unjust that that should happen.
Mr Smith: He was only 16 when
he was convicted of throwing a petrol bomb. Regarding the employment
thing could I also say that it is not just ex-prisoners, it is
their children who are discriminated against, especially by the
civil service. The civil service have a policy of checking back
on people's backgrounds, so it is not just the prisoners themselves,
the whole family is persecuted as well.
| 
