Public bodies should be barred from discriminating against ex-paramilitaries jailed for offences during the Troubles, a body advising on a Northern Ireland Bill of Rights recommended today.
In a 245-page report handed over to the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, it emerged a majority of the Bill of Rights Forum members backed a proposal barring public bodies from discriminating against people because of their age, gender, cultural identity, disability, ethnic origin, sexual orientation, colour, religious belief or lack of and socio-economic status.
It also called for discrimination to be barred against victims of the Troubles, members of the Travelling community and people with irrelevant criminal records or conflict-related convictions.
However the inclusion of former paramilitary prisoners was opposed by Democratic Unionist, Ulster Unionist, cross-community Alliance Party and Catholic Church representatives on the forum.
The commission is made up of five political parties, the human rights, community and voluntary sector, the churches, and business and trade unionists.
The forum also recommended a Bill of Rights should:
- Uphold the right of people to live free from all forms of violence, abuse, maltreatment and harassment from public or private sources including sectarian and paramilitary violence and harassment, domestic violence, sexual violence and harassment and harmful traditional practices and to be protected from sexual exploitation and sexual and other forms of trafficking.
- Declare no-one should be subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment including rape and other forms of sexual assault nor should they be involuntarily returned or extradited to a country where he or she could become a victim of torture or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment.
- Commit public authorities to taking all appropriate measures to make slavery and other forms of forced labour including the trafficking in and exploitation of people and enforced prostitution punishable by law.
- Enshrine the entitlement of people who are arrested to speedy legal proceedings and to face a trial within a reasonable time if they are committed.
- Uphold the right of people of a marriageable age to wed or enter into civil partnership, to found a family and to have a private and family life which can only be interfered with within the law where it is in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, preventing crime or disorder, protecting health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others.
- Place an obligation on inquests to grant family and friends of dead people the right to timely and effective hearings - especially in cases where a state agency is involved - and to compel the person alleged to be responsible for the death as a witness.
- Guarantee freedom of thought, conscience and religion, with people being allowed to change their beliefs, with limitations on religious practices occurring only where it is in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health and morals and the rights and freedoms of others.
- Enshrine the right to freedom of expression except where someone is advocating hatred which could incite discrimination, hostility or violence and the right to have access to information from public authorities except where there is a risk to public safety, of crime and disorder, to the protection of health or morals, the protection of others’ reputations and rights.
- Uphold the right of people to join a political party, trade unions protecting her or his interests and to participate in trade union activity such as strikes and collective bargaining and also the right to freedom of peaceful assembly in the form of processions, protests, parades and other gatherings except where it poses a risk to national security or public safety, could result in disorder or crime and the protection of the health and morals or rights and freedoms of others.
While the DUP supported some provisions, the party was critical of the vast majority of them, with North Belfast Assembly member Nelson McCausland warning that two clauses opened the back door to legalised abortion and Strangford Assembly member Simon Hamilton claiming it was soft on crime.
The DUP’s Peter Weir also noted that, with the exception of church and business representatives, other civil society representatives on the forum were 56 times more likely to support a position adopted by nationalists than unionists. "One of the delegates has completely disowned the report and the representative of the Roman Catholic Church indicated that he would be boycotting today’s handover of the document as a point of principle. This document has fallen at the first hurdle of attracting support across the community," he argued.
The Australian human rights lawyer who chaired the forum, Chris Sidoti, acknowledged that the body could have been more representative of society. However he insisted the report would serve as a useful template for the Human Rights Commission as it set about its work on the Bill of Rights and outlined a broad range of views over 50 areas.
He told the Chief Commissioner: "Your commission will have the benefit of knowing exactly what view each political party and each sector on the forum holds in relation to each area of rights covered. "We have been able to reach consensus on a few issues but not many.
In retrospect that was too hard to expect at this stage of the process but our discussions, even negotiations, have been a good beginning - well and truly a beginning to the work that the Human Rights Commission will now proceed with, building on the work it has undertaken in the past and what we now have done."