Luke Moffett

Seriously Injured Victim Payment Scheme – Providing Some Clarity

Luke Moffett on June 8, 2020, 8:14 am

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There has much debate about the implementation of the pension for seriously injured victims over the past few days. The sites of contention have seemed to shift over the past two weeks from which department would be responsible for the scheme, who will fund it (given its UK reach), who will be eligible to what the guidance on conviction states. Despite much sympathy and sweet words for years by politicians around the pension issue, there has been little push within …

Explainer: Injured Victims’ Payments

Luke Moffett on February 3, 2020, 12:25 pm

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The campaign for a pension for seriously injured victims has been a long road since it started back in 2012, following a report by Marie Breen-Smyth on the impact of the Troubles on those injured. Led by members of the Wave injured group and supported by the Commission for Victims and Survivors, the pension campaign was about remedying the way injured victims had been inadequately compensated in the past, discriminated or ill-treated. For many years the issue was caught in …

Pensions, Reparations and Reintegration: Parallel Processes for Injured Ex-Combatants and Civilians

Luke Moffett on October 23, 2017, 9:14 am

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by Luke Moffett and Kieran McEvoy (School of Law and Mitchell Institute, Queen’s University Belfast) While talks remain on-going about the restoration of the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly, Secretary of State James Brokenshire has apparently confirmed to the Victims and Survivors Forum that a public consultation on dealing with the past will go ahead in the coming weeks. It appears likely that a pension for injured victims, a controversial and important part of the dealing with the past for …

Easy lies and late truths – The daily struggle of dealing with the past in Northern Ireland

Luke Moffett on April 28, 2017, 10:56 am

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In the past three weeks two coroners inquests into disputed shootings during the Troubles have found that two civilians were unjustifiably shot by British soldiers. Manus Deery was 15 when a soldier in an observation post shot him dead in Derry/Londonderry in 1972. Bernard Watt was 28 when a soldier fatally shot him during a riot in Ardoyne in 1971. Both inquests represent some truth for the families in clearing the names of their loved ones. Yet some 45 …

‘The whole truth and nothing but the truth’: Non-disclosure and national security in dealing with the past in Northern Ireland

Luke Moffett on October 30, 2015, 12:39 pm

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Dealing with past in Northern Ireland was never going to be an easy complete deal made before last Christmas. Although nearly a year has passed since the Stormont House Agreement, the actual hard negotiations of the legal intricacies are only now being hammered out. While the draft legislation itself is very technical and abstruse, it is apparent that finding the truth about the past in Northern Ireland is not going to be straightforward. Mark Thompson has been sounding the warning …

Time for a pension for those seriously injured during the Troubles

Luke Moffett on December 3, 2014, 11:46 am

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The Good Friday Agreement secured peace for Northern Ireland. While it is easy for the rest of us to get up out of bed in the morning and get on with our lives, those bereaved and seriously injured are reminded everyday of the past, forgotten and left at the way side, as the rest of us enjoy the peace. It says very little of us as a society that we have not developed a comprehensive reparations policy to acknowledge and …