JOINT COMMITTEE ON THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE GOOD FRIDAY AGREEMENT debate -
Thursday, 5 Jul 2012

UN Security Council Resolution 1325: Discussion

Chairman

I said at my inaugural meeting as Chairman that I would not read the exact wording of the mobile telephone notice. If people have mobile telephones or iPhones, they know the drill. The minutes of the previous meeting, of 21 June, have been circulated. Are any matters arising? No. Are they agreed for signature? Agreed.

We will meet representatives of Hanna's House to discuss the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security on the island of Ireland, North and South. I had the privilege of meeting the organisation and the witnesses were kind enough to say it was a lot less than a year ago. The organisation is doing good work and it is very welcome today. We are interested in what its members have to say. I encourage committee members to use the opportunity to find out more about the organisation.

Before I invite the witnesses to make their presentations I remind them that, by virtue of section 17(2)(l) of the Defamation Act 2009, witnesses are protected by absolute privilege in respect of the evidence you are to give this committee. If you are directed by the committee to cease giving evidence in relation to a particular matter and you continue to so do, you are entitled thereafter only to a qualified privilege in respect of your evidence. You are directed that only evidence connected with the subject matter of these proceedings is to be given and you are asked to respect the parliamentary practice to the effect that, where possible, you should not criticise nor make charges against any person, persons or entity by name or in such a way as to make him, her or it identifiable.

For the information of committee members and those in the Visitors Gallery, the Hanna's House project was created in the mid-90s to mobilise the collective energy of women to work towards feminist ideals of justice, equality and non-violence. The group hosts seminars, workshops and meetings to bring together women from diverse backgrounds to talk about the legacy of the conflict on the island of Ireland and what a feminist peace means to them. Hanna's House has developed a strategic alliance, which is a group more than of 50 women from all corners of Ireland working together to create a more just, equal and non-violent society. In our journey, we are trying to develop a deeper understanding of the conflict and we are always interested in people's perspective.

Ms Shirley Graham

I thank the Chairman and the committee. Representatives of Hanna's House are delighted to be here. We will keep our presentation short because we understand time is at a premium and the meeting has been shortened slightly. I will not go into great detail about the organisation. We have listed some key points on a PowerPoint slide. This is a unique organisation because it is the only cross-Border feminist organisation with a focus on peace and women's issues. That gives us a particular position on Security Council Resolution 1325.

The overarching feedback from over 1,000 women we have met over the past four years, through a series of seminars, workshops, meetings and summer schools is that they want their knowledge, experiences and concerns to be taken seriously by the State and, in particular, that they are looking for transformative policies to make Ireland a more gender equal society. Within the overarching statement from the women we met, we examined Resolution 1325, dealing with women, peace and security. We considered its implementation throughout Ireland using the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement. That is why we are meeting the committee.

We will now deal with why Resolution 1325 is important, why it matters and why it exists. It was adopted by the Security Council in 2000 and it was the first time the Security Council opened its doors to members of civil society and women from conflict countries to hear their specific experiences of conflict. The resolution is groundbreaking because it acknowledges the gendered experiences of conflict. It considers the fact that women and men experience conflict differently and that there are unequal power relationships between women and men during and after conflict. For example, women are more likely to experience socio-economic harm in respect of the loss of home, land or livelihood. They are more likely to be displaced and more likely to take on increased caring roles within the broader community and the family. This is often due to the loss of the main breadwinner in the family due to death, imprisonment or injury.

Typically, they are also excluded from peace talks and peace agreements. Since 1994, global statistics of women's involvement in peace talks stand at 2.4%. There has been no woman leading peace talks. Men are more directly involved in fighting during conflict, more likely to be imprisoned and are generally the people involved in peace talks and negotiations. It highlights this gendered division during and after conflict and examines four broad pillars in terms of nation states' responsibilities to women in a post-conflict era.

It considers women in respect of their participation in leadership and decision-making roles, and particularly their involvement in peace negotiations, the protection of women and girls from violence and it calls for an end to impunity for conflict-related violence against women. It also calls for women's involvement in prevention processes and gender perspectives to be included in the implementation of all national programmes on this issue. It also considers women's rehabilitation and recovery after conflict and the sort of instruments in place to support women to heal from conflict.

The current position in Ireland and Britain is that we have an Irish national action plan. It was adopted and launched in November. Britain also has a national action plan. In Ireland, both action plans are predominantly outward looking, considering Ireland's involvement overseas in terms of development and aid. The Irish national action plan has two provisions on the North of Ireland and the Border counties. I will not go through them but they are contained in the handouts.

The British national action plan does not make any reference to the conflict on these two islands nor does it make any provision for women in the North of Ireland. This is a particular concern and is the reason we are raising it at this meeting.

There has been a development in the Northern Ireland Assembly as an all-party working group has been set up to examine resolution 1325in the North as well. I will not go into any more details around the particular resolution but, perhaps, we can tease them out in the question and answer session later. I hand over to my colleague Ms Claire Hackett to speak about Hanna's House position on resolution 1325.

Ms Claire Hackett

Hanna's House position is that we need a bi-national approach or a Good Friday agreement approach to bring resolution 1325 to bear on the conflict and the peace process. We believe that if resolution 1325 had been in place at the time of the Good Friday Agreement it would have improved the position of the Women's Resource and Development Agency in the negotiations. We are trying to convey strongly that resolution 1325 is not just about the peace agreement but about the ongoing peace process. It should be noted that there are elements in the Good Friday Agreement that are about women's participation in public life but those have still to be delivered, such as women's full and equal political participation in the advancement of women in public life. The way that resolution 1325 is implemented is through Government national action plans. This is a critical tool for delivering resolution 1325 and bringing it to bear. It needs to be brought to bear on our own situation but the Government national action plans are not doing that at the moment. Our analysis is that the two governments need to work together to achieve this aim. There needs to be a co-operative approach and co-operative national action plans. This can be done by the two governments working together with the Northern Ireland Assembly and the Executive. That is the framework that has been created by the Good Friday Agreement and needs to be brought to this process. This is a real opportunity to bring about a new approach to Resolution 1325 where both governments and the Northern Ireland Assembly would work together to have a plan that works for the inclusion of women in the peace process.

There is a whole body of work to be done to make that happen but in the meantime Resolution 1325 could be incorporated into the existing institutions of the Good Friday Agreement - that includes this committee putting Resolution 1325 on the agenda and trying to think how the work of this committee could incorporate it and take on it board. It could also be put on the agenda of all the other institutions, the new North-South Interparliamentary Association, the North-South Ministerial Council, the British-Irish Council and the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly. Those are all areas in which Resolution 1325 could be brought to bear on those institutions.

I return to the idea of producing a plan or plans that co-operate with each other in order to bring the conflict into the frame. The content of those plans would be around dealing with the legacy of the conflict, addressing the participation of women in public life and also the involvement of women in reconstruction and peace building. A plan could have an audit of women's representation, for example, the number of women in the Judiciary, in police oversight bodies, in inquiries or in the historical inquiries team and there could be targets to increase the number of women in those public bodies in public life.

In the area of reconstruction the plans could examine the gender aspects of security sector reform, such as considering women's security needs and the needs around gender based violence or thee issue of disarmament demobilisation and reintegration, DDR, and the particular needs of women ex-convicts. In the area of rehabilitation there could be a gendered approach to dealing with the past or recovery. There could be conflict mapping which examines gender harms and abuses that happened during the conflict and women could be involved in evidence gathering around that issue. The plan could also set targets. There could be a focus on post-traumatic stress disorder and intergenerational trauma. Those aims could be achieved through co-operative plans.

We are planning a major conference on 5 November 2012 to bring together ideas for the content of co-operative plans and also how to take forward the concept of a bilateral approach.

We have a number of specific requests we wish to make of this committee and will conclude with those.

Chairman

I thank Ms Claire Hackett. Perhaps I will allow her to sum up at the end.

Mr. Pat Doherty, MP, MLA

I congratulate the Chairman on his appointment. I welcome the delegation and its submission. To some extent, Ms Claire Hackett may have touched on some of the issues around Resolution 1325. The Irish Government has an action plan. Ms Hackett says the British Government also has an action plan with no reference to the Six Counties and I understand it is a non-devolved matter. How do we get Resolution 1325 devolved to the assembly in order that we can end up through all of the North-South institutions having an all-Ireland action plan? I would appreciate if that point could be developed.

Chairman

I will take the second contributor, Senator Jim D'Arcy, who will be followed by Ms Michelle Gildernew.

Senator Jim D’Arcy

The delegation is welcome and its presentation was interesting. In Dundalk in the early 1970s, I recall when seeking my political identity I attended a Sinn Féin meeting with a good friend before I decided to continue my family tradition as a blue shirt. At that meeting the peace people were present and I recall them being shouted down. Joe Cahill said these people may be our enemies but they must be allowed to speak. He did not really mean they were enemies but he was trying to cool the hot heads. In literature, probably one of the best quotes is from Seán O'Casey in "The Plough and the Stars", "Sacred Heart of Jesus, take away our hearts of stone and give us hearts of flesh!" in the voice of a woman, Bessie Burgess. I am not saying women are more peaceful than men - I do not find that at home; neither am I trying to be patronising but there is an enormous role for women in public life. My question is to Mr. Claire Hackett. Does she think there should be gender quotas as such? She has spoken about increasing the role and participation of women. I say that in the context of the 30% quota for women. Would she welcome that in the North?

Ms Michelle Gildernew, MP, MLA

I congratulate the Chairman on his new role. I apologise to the committee and the delegation from Hanna's House for my late arrival. I am sorry I missed part of the presentation. It is great to see Ms Claire Hackett and the members of the delegation. We would very much support the aims of Hanna's House and the need to better integrate the UN Security Council resolution into national peace building. We believe more needs to be done to support victims of conflict and particularly victims in the Twenty-six Counties in terms of the UN Security Council resolution and the rehabilitation and recovery needs of women and children post conflict. It appears the Dublin Government has withdrawn support and yet there are a number of outstanding issues in respect of women and children who have been affected by the conflict and whose needs are not being taken into consideration. I would appreciate more detail on that issue.

Ms Ann Hope

I will try to answer Mr. Doherty's question on separate national action plans and the fact that the Northern Ireland Assembly does not have an action plan of its own because it is not a devolved power. As a UN resolution, the actions of national governments have international standing and, therefore, Northern Ireland cannot prepare a national action plan on its own. We are aware that co-operation on and sharing of the issues set out in the plans can be sensitive given that the primary relationship between the Dublin Government and the Northern Ireland Executive is a North-South one. We will not on any occasion ask the Dublin Government to bypass the Northern Ireland Assembly and approach the British Government directly on this issue. It is a question of how co-operation and sharing are achieved.

One of the issues that arises for us is that while the British Government cannot deny there was a conflict in the North of Ireland for more than 30 years, it does not recognise it as a conflict coming under the terms of the Geneva Convention. That is its rationale for excluding Resolution 1325 from its national action plan. We believe there are ways of getting around that issue by working with the Northern Ireland Executive and the committee dealing with Resolution 1325 in the Assembly. We could develop an Northern Ireland action plan which does not have international standing but would be a first step towards considering the east-west as well as the North-South strand of the Good Friday Agreement. As the plans will be up for review in several years' time, the Northern Ireland Assembly will have an opportunity to approach the British Government with a view to including the measures we advocate in the next action plan. In the meantime, an action plan could be developed in the North and rolled out via the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement, which do not cut across the relationship between the UK Government and the Government in the Republic of Ireland but take into account the Northern Ireland Assembly. Common elements have already been produced through shared and common chapters. For example, Structural Funds and the Irish national development plan have common chapters. There are ways of inserting national action plans into common chapters which do not take away from individual governments' right to devise national action plans.

Senator Mary Moran

I will comment briefly because a vote has been called in the Seanad. I support the work that the witnesses are doing. I recently chaired a conference in Dundalk on the subject of how women are affected by violence. I was astounded at the ability of the 50 women who were in attendance to vocalise how the Troubles affected them. I agree that we need more women in government. What can we do to support this work?

Dr. Margaret Ward

I was also involved in the event to which Senator Moran referred, as well as its follow-up conference in Newry. The conferences were part of a PEACE III funded project in which my organisation is involved. I am pleased that she mentioned it.

In regard to Mr. Doherty's comment on Resolution 1325, we have a good opportunity to influence the process because the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, to which the UK Government is a signatory, is due for a periodic review next year. The Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister has a role in that review. The last hearing on the convention recommended that Resolution 1325 be fully implemented in the North and expressed its disappointment at the lack of information on the subject. The UK Government will be held responsible for the little it has done thus far. The Assembly can play a role when the evidence is being gathered because the Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister will contribute a substantial part of the UK report that will be prepared for the review. I ask Northern representatives to ensure this issue is addressed because, as far as we are concerned, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women is international and binding and, therefore, its recommendation on Resolution 1325 ought to be implemented.

Ms Claire Hackett

We welcome quotas as a useful tool. Any plans produced co-operatively could strengthen the idea of quotas for the participation and representation of women in public life. On the issue of victims in the Twenty-six Counties, this type of gap will occur when Resolution 1325 is not properly implemented. While the Irish national action plan refers to cross-Border engagement and civil society learning, there is no specific mention of women victims or the gender harm that women have experienced. That is a gap that a co-operative approach could address. Victims do not think of themselves as being in one jurisdiction or the other. They think about their needs and that is how we need to approach the issue. A co-operative approach could bring these issues to the fore.

Deputy Seán Crowe

I welcome the delegation. Women played important roles during the negotiations, although many of them have been written out of history. I refer, for example, to Rita O'Hare, Lucilita Breathnach, Barbara de Brún, Michelle Gildernew and the late Siobhán O'Hanlon. They were not around simply to make up numbers or for optics, but played an important part in the process. The history of this time emphasises the leadership of Sinn Féin.

If we prepare a national action plan it will have to be action specific. I understand from speaking with victims of the conflict, including prisoners' wives and their children, that real support is still lacking. Many of these women did not know their spouses were involved until they heard the knock on the door as the police came to arrest them. They experienced trauma while bringing their children on prison visits over the years. In many of the families, intergenerational trauma has also affected the children. There is no additional support or care for these families. We are good at meetings and saying we will do this or that. We talk in terms of actions in relation to ex-prisoners, etc., but the reality is that it does not filter down. There are politicians saying one thing but the activity in terms of supports is not evident.

I note that there are two actions in the Irish NAP. I recognise that it is a UN matter. The plan itself is a little weak. As part of this, will there be a review of the NAP? I suppose that is where Ms Graham's proposals may come into play. What needs to come out of this meeting is that as part of the review of the NAP, which I am conscious started only in 2011, and similar to what Mr. Pat Doherty stated, there needs to be both North-South and east-west involvement.

Chairman

Ms Graham might answer the question and sum up as well because we are constrained by time.

Ms Shirley Graham

I thank Deputy Crowe for that question. On the Irish national action plan, an independent monitoring group is being set up under an independent chair. As of yet, we do not have any information. We are not aware that this has happened yet or that a chair has been appointed. As far as we are concerned, this is something that is in the process but has not come about thus far and we are waiting to hear more about that.

I thank the committee members for taking the time to listen to our presentation. We have some "asks", some things we would like them to do that we covered in the presentation but which I want to reiterate before we leave. We would like the committee to visit women's organisations and networks and listen first hand to their experiences and needs in the North, the South and along the Border counties. When working with organisations and institutions, we ask them to ask about women's involvement and at what level they are involved, and how those institutions and organisations work on gender issues. We ask them to engage with MPs and MLAs on this issue and to influence them to consider the production of a co-operative plan. We also ask them to discuss with MPs and MLAs our ideas on gender mainstreaming throughout the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement, looking at how policies, programming and plans impact on women and men differently and taking those considerations on board. We would also like the committee to engage with the Resolution 1325 committee of the Northern Ireland Assembly to discuss this issue and to meet northern members of that committee to discuss this issue and to take this forward.

Our final "ask" for today is that we would like all the committee members to come to our conference on 5 November where we will talk about Resolution 1325 and its implementation through the Good Friday Agreement, and look at developing a shadow action plan and take that forward to the next stages. We would be delighted if the committee members would come along to Croke Park on 5 November. Once again, I thank the committee.

Chairman

I thank Ms Graham and her colleagues. It has been a good debate. I note time has constrained us.

Perhaps we should put on record the historic occasion in Stormont yesterday where there was formal approval of the North-South Interparliamentary Association. If Ms Graham is looking for a North-South mechanism, that might be a natural place to go. It was great news yesterday. This is an implementation body, and one of the components that was outstanding. It is important that we record that.

If Ms Graham was looking at the east-west dimension, there is the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly. She should feel free to get in touch with that body because these are two separate elements of the Good Friday Agreement, east-west and North-South.

We wish Ms Graham well in her work. We will take up her challenge of going to different women's groups throughout the North and throughout the South. We visited the women's centre in Strabane a few weeks ago, and we have initiated that work. We will take up her invite for her conference on 5 November and wish her well with it. I thank Ms Graham.

Ms Shirley Graham

I thank the Chairman.

Chairman

I propose the committee suspend for a few minutes in order to bring in the next group.