Examination of Witnesses (Questions 320-333)
MS SANDRA
PEAKE, WITNESS
A, WITNESS B, WITNESS
C, WITNESS D, WITNESS
E, WITNESS F AND
WITNESS G
21 FEBRUARY 2005
Q320 Mr Beggs: Is it true to say that
the truth gives closure to victims?
Witness A: It is a very difficult
question in many respects. First of all, people sometimes talk
about victims as if they are talking about one person or one constituency
that all think the same thing. That is not necessarily the case.
Victims are like everybody else in life, they are all different.
For some truth would undoubtedly bring closure. I do not want
to speak on behalf of the disappeared but the truth of where a
body is I think would be hugely beneficial to a number of the
families around this table. Would that bring closure or would
it lead to other questions about why, how, who, when? I really
do not know. For myself, I do not necessarily need to know all
the facts. I know that my wife was murdered. I know the IRA murdered
her. I know who planted the bomb and even though the people who
planted the bomb, 19-year old kids, went out and were obviously
sent there by someone much older, much wiser, I do not for myself
necessarily need to know that but I recognise that there are those
who do need to know and they cannot move on until they get that
information. The information should be available for those that
want it.
Q321 Chairman: They were killed as well,
is that right?
Witness A: One was killed and
one was released under the Good Friday Agreement.
Q322 Chairman: One was convicted and
then released?
Witness A: He served four years
for nine murders.
Witness F: For myself the truth
might not bring closure but certainly it would help in my father's
case. As I have said, he was shot by the B-Specials. The bullet
that shot my father was never found. I was only aware of that
quite recently. Also, under the 30-year rule government papers
were released in 2001 and information came out of that. That for
me is not enough. My mother never went forward to find out any
more but there are questions I want to know the answers to. Where
did the bullet go that shot my father? Who fired that bullet?
For me that would probably help our family, not that we are going
to do anything about it but it would help us in some way.
Q323 Mr Beggs: How effective has the
Commission for the Disappeared been in uncovering the truth about
what happened to your loved ones and what more could it do?
Ms Peake: I think this question
should be centred around what the Commission was set up to do
and what the expectations and needs of the families are in respect
of the Commission and the two do not always marry. The reality,
I suppose, is that because of the nature of where a lot of the
sites have been there has been more contact with the Commission
in the south than in the north. Part of some of the families that
are not included on the list but that have struggled is that if
there is information out there how can it be channelled when the
Commission is not a body that has got a profile and an identity
that is very clearly seen? That is around what the Commission
was set up to do and what the expectations and needs of the families
are.
Witness D: In 1999 when first
things started for my mother and the rest of the disappeared I
did not even know there was a Commission set up. I first heard
of my worst day on TV. No-one took the time to contact me or the
rest of my brothers and sisters. They did contact one of my family
members but she did not make it aware to us what was going to
take place. For me, when I saw it for the first time on TV where
my mother was buried it was a big hurt to me that it happened
like that. I would like it to be that if it was going to take
place they should contact family members. I hope for the rest
of my family that other people never experience that.
Q324 Mr Beggs: Let us hope that they
learn from that bad experience. How much did the list of the disappeared
issued by the IRA in 1999 contribute to the truth about what happened
to your loved ones?
Witness D: In the case of my mother,
they said my mother was buried on one beach and she was on another
beach not half a mile away. They told us my mother's body was
buried on Templetown Beach and she was actually buried on Shellinghill
Beach. The two beaches are similar but there was a landmark on
the beach where she was found and there was no landmark whatsoever
on the other beach, so they should have known. It was people from
that area that had buried my mother because no-one from the north
would have found that beach.
Ms Peake: Some of the reasons
that were given the families found quite hurtful and also they
would have disputed that and they thought it was an example of
trying to give information which potentially was not positive
for the families. Also, for the other families whose loved ones
were not claimed on that list, that list represented a further
closing down of information concerning their loved ones and they
found that difficult.
Witness E: In 1999 the IRA had
said that my brother had been an agent provocateur, which
obviously did not go down well with the family. We are still trying
to find out the reason behind why he was taken and eventually
murdered. We have also been trying to find out information from
the police files, coming at it from that side as well. Hopefully,
we will have a meeting in April or May but, with regard to yourselves,
if something comes back and they say to us, "No, we cannot
tell you anything with regard to security of information",
do we or the other families have any other angles to go at that
you are aware of?
Q325 Mr Luke: The Chairman in his preamble
set out the remit of this committee but we are only at the very
beginning of what we are looking at, which is in response to what
the Secretary of State is trying to find out, whether it is possible
to get a truth commission set up. In your view do you believe
the time is right for a truth commission for Northern Ireland
and what benefit would that have over the normal formalistic style
of public inquiries and the criminal justice system?
Ms Peake: In terms of the work
we do we are working with quite a number of people. We really
do not know. There will be families who would want to see a formal
truth process and there are others who would potentially find
that very difficult. As Alan has said, there are lots of differences
even within families about the approach the families would want
to see taken. One of the factors here is that there are a thousand
other families who do need truth and comfort and a mechanism to
do that but it might not be one mechanism; it might be several.
The one thing I suppose is that the Secretary of State has announced
a consultation but nobody really has heard about it. There is
a lot of mystery around it and a lot of suspicion because mystery
and lack of knowledge bring suspicion and I think we would have
people, quite rightly, asking us, "What is it about? What
is it set up to do? Have you heard about it?", and quite
simply we can say we have not, so there is a difficulty with that.
Q326 Mr Luke: That comment has been made
to us before. In some of the evidence we have taken previously,
talking about different approaches, some people advocate a much
more general practices and patterns approach in the whole issue
of dealing with trauma. Others have argued for a much more individual
approach, for example, the location of bodies and so on. At the
end of the day would a process which did not establish the truth
about individual events be satisfactory to the victims?
Ms Peake: For some families no,
it would not be. For some families that would be a prime need
and it would also be a form of justice and recognition.
Witness D: From what different
people have talked about it seems that a lot of them are saying
that until it is tied up it is always going to be there.
Q327 Mr Luke: Lastly, and this is your
chance to put it on record because you say you have not heard
much from the Secretary of State but the Secretary of State will
read this report, how do you believe this debate or this process
should be carried forward?
Witness A: Personally speaking,
and again I find it quite difficult to speak representing WAVE
because we have such a broad church of people, we have people
that voted no in the Agreement and people who voted yes and people
who could not care less about the Agreement in our organisation
so it is very hard to represent such a diverse group of people.
Therefore, if I could speak just for myself for a moment, I have
some reservations around Paul Murphy leading a consultation on
a truth commission. I believe it should be someone who is totally
independent, who would not have been a participant in the conflict
at all, who would be the best person to lead such a consultation.
The other thing that I would be a wee bit concerned about would
be the associations that people draw between here and South Africa,
almost as though the South African model of truth is the only
model that existed. Paul Murphy did not do an awful lot to dispel
that myth when the very first place that he visited was South
Africa itself, given that he was probably well aware that people
had concerns like that. There have been something like 30 truth
commissions that have happened around the world. If you ever set
up a commission to look at the truth I think you need to look
at all these models and come up with a model that would work in
Northern Ireland. I would be sceptical, I will be honest with
you, about whether we could have a model that would work here
but at the minute nobody knows what they are talking about and
I think only when we have that consultation led by the right people
will the debate be informed.
Chairman: If I might interject there,
you may criticise Paul Murphy for going to South Africa, but at
least he went with an open mind and came back and said that he
did not think that was the right model at all, so some purpose
was served by that.
Mr Luke: We recognise that there may
be other models and perhaps in the next stage of this we will
be looking at different models.
Q328 Mr Campbell: On the issue of commemoration
and memorials, WAVE comments that there have been a number of
commemorative projects in Northern Ireland. Which of these do
you think have been the most successful ones and could you tell
us why they have been so successful?
Ms Peake: We have engaged in a
number of projects looking at different themes, mostly using WAVE
arts, for example, the stained glass project which is in the Ulster
Museum, which was undertaken by families. It is 19 panes of glass
each depicting an image. I suppose the other that I could mention
would be around the disappeared which was a commemorative remembrance
project last year, which was the release of black and white balloons
from the City Hall and along with that was a story-telling initiative
by Families of the Disappeared, which was a very important project.
So many of the projects are centred within and around certain
themes and certainly we have found that families have found them
to be very beneficial, providing that they are set up right.
Q329 Mr Campbell: You have anticipated
my next question about the disappeared and the commemoration at
the City Hall. Is there any permanent memorial or is there a plan
to have anything of a permanent nature regarding the families
of the disappeared?
Witness D: No, because at the
moment there are a lot of bodies still missing so they do not
want to put one down because they do not think there is closure.
That is one of the reasons why they do not want a memorial.
Q330 Mr Campbell: Has any thought been
given, assuming a successful outcome to the remainder of the bodies
being found, to doing something then?
Witness D: Yes.
Witness B: That would be the main
thing.
Q331 Mr Campbell: Would that be something
of a permanent nature, some sort of memorial?
Witness D: Yes, it probably would
be a memorial.
Witness B: From my point of view
I think it would be. My difficulty with the question is that for
us the recovery of the bodies of our loved ones is unfinished
business and therefore it is difficult for us to address that
issue. It comes back to Mr Beggs' question about truth and does
this facilitate it. My response to that would be that what would
help me to move on would be to bury my nephew and until that happens
I have a difficulty, but I suspect that at the end of this process
if all the bodies were recovered then that would be something
that we would discuss and there would then be a purpose to move
forward.
Witness C: The best memorial would
be a headstone. That is our base line.
Q332 Mr Beggs: What contact has this
independent commission that has been established actually had
with those who are waiting for bodies being identified? How frequently
do they make contact with you?
Witness C: They have not. We would
have met the commissioners in WAVE headquarters and that would
have been the time that we as a family would have met them. The
individual families probably would have met them when the burial
sites were being excavated but since those days there has not
been any.
Q333 Mr Beggs: So they do not report
every six months that there has been any progress?
Witness C: Nothing.
Witness B: Again, part of the
total frustration of this group is that in relation to the commission
and in relation to the political parties, and I have spoken to
senior members of Sinn Fein, there is nothing. It is very difficult
to get any information that moves this process forward in any
way and that is a complete frustration.
Witness C: Whenever they did the
digs there was a consortium of information gathered at that particular
stage and I know when we met the commissioners I had asked them
if they would give each family even a dossier or synopsis or report
of what happened on their dig, not the general information, which
they did not want. That has not happened and it must be August
two years ago when we asked for that information. We still have
not got it. We might as well disappear when it comes to it because
we have to keep coming forward and saying we are still here. It
would be helpful if somebody could try and get information for
us.
Ms Peake: It goes back to the
expectations of the commission and what it was set up to do, the
work the families would like to see it undertake and also the
fact that there is no permanent base and no civil servants attached
to it permanently. That has been part of the difficulty. Also,
in terms of looking at specialist investigation or the use of
personal testimonies or special searching equipment or what there
has been done internationally, there has been none of that or
none of that which is visible and that has been a difficulty.
A lot of the contact has been more with the south because of the
nature of where the digs are but the issues are pertinent to everyone
and I think the families have got to work a lot more in confidence
with each other and that has only been over the last number of
years.
Chairman: Ladies and gentlemen, thank
you very much. It has been a very interesting and helpful session
to us and you will see the fruits of our labours when we report
in due course.
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