Claire Hanna MP: speeches

Speeches

• 10 Jun 2026 · Belfast: Violent Disorder · Hansard source

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  It has been a shocking two days in Northern Ireland. The horrific knife attack in north Belfast has left a man fighting for his life, and an entire community distressed by what they have seen. Justice must of course take its course and deliver for that victim, whose family have asked for calm. Last night brought further outrage. Children in my constituency, and in others, were lifted out of their beds as their homes burned. Masked men roamed the streets, going from door to door, menacing and setting fire to cars, buses and homes, terrorising people on the basis of the colour of their skin or the sound of their voice—people from Sudan, people from India, people from Ukraine, and people from Belfast. Today, businesses are shuttered, medical appointments are cancelled, and schools are being closed for fear of getting young people home. So many people are frighted to walk the streets and to be in their own homes tonight. And when all the online agitators who stoke this stuff move on to their next target, we will be the ones left to pick up the pieces. People are of course entitled to their views on immigration, and of course Government policy is not perfect, but this has not been a debate or conversation. There have not been proposals, and there has not been honesty about the trade-offs. There has been mob justice, and some of the same-old, same-old proposals for a hardened border on the island of Ireland. Political leaders have a duty to lead, not to lean into people’s worst fears and anxieties. That video of the awful crime in north Belfast was unusual in its brutality, but the cycle of deflection and disorder has not been unusual. We have seen this movie too many times before. In Belfast we know all about blaming an entire community for the actions of others, we know all about scapegoating and tit-for-tat violence, and we know all about street justice. Violence creates division. It is affecting our economy, and undermining the vast majority of people in Northern Ireland who want to work together to build a better future. What support will the Government provide to those who have been harmed by this awful violence? Will they ensure swift justice for all the perpetrators of the last few days, and what will they do to bring to heel the online platforms that drive this madness?

• 20 May 2026 · Defence Readiness · Hansard source

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  Will the shadow Minister acknowledge that no party and no victims’ group in Northern Ireland supports the Conservative party’s approach to the past, and that even the Dillon judgment last week did not in any way rule it legal? Would he not agree that soldiers following the rule of law is a matter of recruitment, too? No soldier wants to be painted with the brush of not having followed the rule of law. Would he care to tell the House how many of the 300,000 soldiers who served under Operation Banner in Northern Ireland have faced judicial proceedings? It is in the very low two figures.

• 19 Mar 2026 · Northern Ireland: Legacy of the Past · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for all her efforts on behalf of victims of the troubles and others. This is a chance to put in place accountability mechanisms that we should have put in place decades ago, particularly for those who do not have a judicial pathway. Families in Derry know what happened in their city on Bloody Sunday, regardless of a verdict. IRA victims know what directing terrorism looks like—the explaining away, the casualness with life—regardless of a judicial process. Does the hon. Member agree that legislation alone will not get us to truth and a reconciled future, and that this must be an opportunity for those who created victims to step forward, bravely, to give that long overdue accountability: for the UK Government to accept that they compromised key human rights protections and at times colluded with paramilitaries; for loyalist paramilitaries to accept that their war was with innocent Catholics; and for the IRA to step up and acknowledge their decades of coercion of communities, and their casualness with human lives—in seeking to achieve an outcome that could never have been achieved in any way other than democratically?

• 18 Mar 2026 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  We have seen this play out before: a US rush to military escalation with no plan for what comes next. We have seen schoolgirls bombed in Iran, whole families killed in Lebanon, chaos in a region already scarred by repression and genocide, and economic shocks that hurt the most vulnerable at home. In Irish, there is a phrase, “Ní mhealltar an sionnach faoi dhó”—have we learned no lessons? People are asking exactly that: how many times do these horrors play out before the lessons are learned? The Prime Minister has said that the UK “will not be drawn into the wider war.” Will he guarantee two things: that that position will hold in the face of mounting pressure from Trump and Netanyahu, and that this House will get a vote before the UK is involved in any further conflict?

• 21 Jan 2026 · Northern Ireland Troubles: Legacy and Reconciliation · Hansard source

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  The Social Democratic and Labour party welcomes this remedial order, which goes some way to restoring the rule of law to legacy processes and in turn to the present day. The introduction by the previous Government of an amnesty and the closure of processes was the very definition of the phrase, “Justice delayed is justice denied”. This order is specifically about the troubles legacy Bill, but across these islands—in every jurisdiction, every day—we can see evidence of cases where wrongs were not properly addressed at the time. We now see the hurt and the damage compounded by delay, whether it is Hillsborough, infected blood, the Post Office scandal or the Magdalene laundries. There will not be a Member of this House who cannot speak to an experience in their own constituency. My ask is simply that Members think about my constituents and people across Northern Ireland in the same way. It is not about who won. I have to bite my tongue quite a lot in this House, and particularly today. The people who are waiting to access some of these processes—none of them have won. All of them have lost members of their family. It is not about people being able to draw a line under the past because MPs in London have told them to. MPs have called them IRA sympathisers. The previous legislation, which this order undoes, was not about reconciliation or truth. The word “reconciliation” appeared in the title of the Bill and nowhere else. The Bill was about closing down truth and ensuring that republican and loyalist paramilitaries would again have their crimes retrospectively legalised. It was not just a free pass for paramilitaries, and I am not here to write a reference for any of them. Tens of thousands of them did at least go through the justice system, but these provisions and amnesties extended to the darkest corners—yes, of the security services, but also to those who directed the terrorism and who played God with people’s lives, and who should of course be held to the law. The Conservatives justified their approach with the fiction that nothing is working, but inquests have worked. They were belated, yes, because there was a failure to address the crimes at the time or to fund the system. Those inquests have been complex and expensive, but that is because of the layers of veto and information suppression that have been applied by those with the most to hide. Those inquiries have also exposed truth and corrected false narratives. I think of the Ballymurphy families; the Parachute Regiment, just five months before they went on to kill in Bloody Sunday, opened fire on innocent civilians, falsely labelling them as armed threats. The 2021 inquest freed those families—freed people who had grown up with a lifetime of being told that their mother, their father or their parish priest was a gunman, when it was entirely obvious that that was not true. They finally got accountability from a regiment that operated without it. False narratives have been used by the security forces, by the IRA and by republican and loyalist terrorists to impugn and to add grievous insult to injury for so many victims. I also think of the Kingsmill massacre; an inquest less than two years ago rightly concluded that that was a sectarian attack, where 10 Protestant workmen were murdered in an act of ethnic cleansing by the IRA. That was carried out by people who claimed the legacy of James Connolly while shooting dead the very people who he would have stood alongside. When people say that it is IRA sympathisers who benefit from these inquests, it is such an insult to decent and non-sectarian people like Alan Black. I particularly welcome the ending of the immunity scheme. We have had the Good Friday agreement and the bitter pills to swallow in that, and Eames-Bradley and Haass-O’Sullivan and the on-the-run letters, and all the other processes that have put the needs of victim makers ahead of victims. This legislation turns that around. However, it is just the beginning: we have to get the processes right if we are to escape the shackles of the past and create a space that is for truth, accountability and remembrance. This has to be rooted in the future as much as it is in the past, but also in human rights compliance, truth and justice. Today I again urge the Secretary of State and the Prime Minister, where concerns exist about disclosure, ECHR compatibility and judicial independence, to ensure that we face down those vested interests, in or out of uniform, and show Britain as a democracy that upholds laws and rights. Dealing with legacy will not be confined to the remedial order, the troubles Bill or the joint framework. As Members on both sides of the House know, it shapes our politics, our policing, how communities relate to each other, and how we can best deliver a shared future. We cannot afford another missed opportunity. The answers will not all be found in this order, or in the legislation that is to come. We have never needed a complex legal process for people to acknowledge what they did: for the IRA to acknowledge that they used human lives, nearly 2,000 of them, as collateral damage; for loyalists to acknowledge that their war was with innocent Catholics; and for the UK security forces to acknowledge that their soldiers did not always uphold the law. I can stand here and acknowledge that so many did serve decently—did try to serve decently. I can stand here and acknowledge the pride that many Members feel in the service given by them and by their loved ones. However, I hope that others can acknowledge that that was not the experience that everyone in Northern Ireland had. Three hundred thousand soldiers served in Operation Banner, and fewer than two dozen of them have ever faced judicial proceedings. We have wasted a lot of the time of victims’ families, and we have wasted money as well. It is time to move forward. The Bill is the start of that, and I ask Members to approach it in that framework and with respect for the dignity of all the people who lost their lives in Northern Ireland.

• 13 Jan 2026 · Northern Ireland Political Institutions: Reform · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Vaz. I confess that I have not been in Westminster Hall for a while; I was watching the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) to see exactly when I should stand up. I thank the hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sorcha Eastwood) for securing the debate, which is an important part of the conversation as the case for modest Assembly reform builds. The Social Democratic and Labour party has been working quite intensively to find common ground and take this conversation beyond campaigning and graphics and into the realm of the possible. I welcome the indications from the Prime Minister last week, when I asked him at Prime Minister’s questions, that the UK Government are freshly open to engagement. There had been a fairly hands-off approach. I restate the SDLP’s frustration that the Executive parties have made not a single step towards reform. In spite of election campaigning, there is nothing in the programme for government. I welcome the Assembly’s acceptance of an SDLP proposal to take some of this issue on through the Assembly and Executive Review Committee, but if anybody wants to see an example of an issue being slow-walked, it is that committee’s discussion and inquiry over the past year. As with the agreement that created the institutions, we accept that parties are approaching this issue from different places and at different paces. As with that agreement, it is also clear that we will not come to a conclusion without some sort of facilitation. I will not spend much time on the need for reform: the periodic collapses, the quagmire and stalemate on public policy, the daily draining away of public confidence, this week’s failure to agree a multi-year budget and the feedback from Baroness Hallett in the covid inquiry last week all ably make the case, as did the hon. Member for Lagan Valley. The flaws are by culture and by design. There is much recrimination about some of what is in the agreement, but hon. Members need to be reminded that we were trying to end a hot war and resolve a centuries-old conflict, which the agreement very largely did, in spite of what my colleague Mark Durkan memorably called the “ugly scaffolding”.

• 18 Nov 2025 · Northern Ireland Troubles Bill · Hansard source

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  Time is short, but I hope that we can consider why, as well as how, pain is to be addressed in Northern Ireland. The Social Democratic and Labour party approaches legacy from a basis that considers the rule of law, equality before the law, and the impact on reconciliation. We recognise that this is not a sterile debate, taking place only in this Chamber or in Committee Rooms, and it is not a knockabout for a headline or a tweet; it is a daily reality for many thousands of families. While the issue of legacy remains unresolved, it is like a fog around us in Northern Ireland, shaping the tone of our politics, and affecting how communities interact with one another, our policing, and the ability of Government to deliver. This Bill is not perfect—legislation rarely is—but we cannot miss the opportunity to deal with legacy. This is not about an obsession with the past. Getting this right is about an obsession with a non-violent and reconciled future. It is positive that we are discussing a bilateral agreement between the Irish Government and the Government in London. This is a much-needed departure from the unilateralism pursued by the last Government. Despite clear warnings, they pressed ahead with a deeply flawed legacy Act, which was not only struck down by the courts, but rejected by every single party in the north or south of Ireland, and by more or less every single victim or survivor who spoke on the record. They exploited the fiction that we had to draw a line under the past because nothing else was working, while fighting and stalling the processes that were in place. The Conservative party’s approach to legacy diminished the rule of law, disregarded bilateral communities and, worse, wasted the time, the years and the energy of so many blameless victims and survivors. The joint framework allows both Governments to begin meeting their responsibilities for dealing with the past. We acknowledge the journey and the effort of the Secretary of State and his officials. Although we will seek by amendment to make the final legislation robust enough to withstand less well-intentioned political oversight, I understand that people are working closely on this across the Irish sea, and that Dublin’s legislation will be published swiftly once this Bill has made its way through the House, so that its architecture is compatible with the arrangements we have at the end of the legislative process here. It is right that these things be delivered in parallel, and right that it is a partnership. When people make lurid claims about what the Irish Government have or have not done, but cry foul at any attempt to address it, I can view that only as cynicism. The SDLP does not pick and choose which victims we support. We do not pick and choose who we demand accountability from. Every death was a tragedy, and every murder was wrong. Publicly and privately, we will push Dublin, as we will push everyone else, on its obligations and its omissions from this framework, and on the Omagh inquiry. We will not tolerate or dignify the distortions and the revisionism of those, including many on the Opposition side of this House, who attempt to draw an equivalence, from London, between the Government of the Irish Republic and the murder machine of paramilitaries, or the systematic involvement of paramilitaries. From the early days of the conflict, victims have borne the most—including lacklustre investigations and the release of prisoners—and asked the least, which we accept was a hard pill to swallow. To go far outwith the Good Friday agreement, they have had that compounded by an uneven transition for paramilitaries, on-the-run letters, decades of cynical memorialisation, and the immunity scheme that was in place under the previous Government. Unlike others, the SDLP does not accept that violence was either inevitable or justified. Regardless of context, for military commanders and IRA commanders, violence was a choice. Planting bombs in busy town centres was a choice. Arming paramilitaries was a choice. Opening fire on innocent civil rights marchers was a choice. Brushing all those crimes under the carpet, as the previous Government attempted to do, was also a choice. The deaths of far too many innocent people were treated as collateral. Decisions were made that some lives were worth less, having been expended for a goal that could never have been achieved that way. That has never been properly acknowledged. The IRA has never needed a legal process to admit that truth, and it made that futile and brutal choice many times. Loyalist paramilitaries have never acknowledged that their war was with innocent Catholics, and that their victims were selected purely on the basis of the family or faith that they were born into. They do not need legacy legislation to acknowledge that point. Likewise, the running of state agents by security forces was not a “necessary evil”; it was reckless and morally corrosive, and it should shame those who conducted it, and those trying to pretend it did not happen. Uncomfortable as it may be for many, including in this House, we must address disclosure in order to understand how non-state actors also operated with impunity. For many, directing terrorism had very little to do with political ideals and more to do with power, control and dominance over the communities they claimed to defend. Legacy processes need to shore up confidence in the rule of law. How this House legislates on legacy will have an effect on confidence in policing. There is no perfect way to address our troubled past. We have to be honest that there is not a pathway to justice, or even truth, for every family, but we have to deliver on promises made to so many over the years. As for those who suffered loss, I hear daily their dignity, fortitude and the wisdom that can emerge from pain. We should hear and heed those voices, and we should proceed with the Bill. I will finish with the words of a fine Ulster poet, John Hewitt: “Bear in mind these dead: I can find no plainer words.” He asked us not to differentiate between people, depending on how they died, but to offer truth and justice for all of them.

• 14 Oct 2025 · Northern Ireland Troubles · Hansard source

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  I thank the Secretary of State and his team for their work on this package, including the hon. Member for Putney (Fleur Anderson), who was so well regarded by everybody who came across her in Northern Ireland. I also thank the officials in the Department of Foreign Affairs in Dublin for their work, because that partnership is vital to moving forward. The Social Democratic and Labour party acknowledges the progress in this package if it is faithfully captured in the legislation. When we push for more and better, please know that that comes from a sincere and long-held determination to get this right for families, survivors and our society as a whole. Despite some opinions to the contrary, including recently, I do not believe that most people believe that any murder in Northern Ireland was justified, inevitable, useful or worthy of cover-up, and perpetuating those narratives is an enormous challenge for the present and the future, too. Does the Secretary of State agree that all the work invested by families, campaigners and his officials will be worth nothing if those who created victims—whether republican or loyalist paramilitaries or the state forces who assisted them—do not approach this with full transparency and disclosure and put honesty and the needs of victims over the needs of their own narratives?

• 1 Sept 2025 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  Last month, along with eight party leaders across Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, I wrote to the Prime Minister about the catastrophic situation in Gaza and the deficits in the UK response to the unbearable suffering we are seeing—biblical levels of injustice, pain and hunger. Does the Foreign Secretary recognise the parallel crisis in the belief of ordinary people across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland in international law and in the UK’s response? People are not seeing their values reflected in the UK’s actions in the continued supply of arms, the failure to levy all possible sanctions, and the strings attached to the recognition of the state of Palestine.