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The UK government is seeking a legal way to prevent former Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams from claiming compensation for imprisonment in the 1970s during the Troubles conflict in Northern Ireland.
“We will look at every conceivable way to prevent this type of compensation case,” Sir Keir Starmer told the House of Commons on Wednesday, referring to Adams and hundreds of others who were arrested during this period.
Opposition conservatives criticized the government's plans to abolish provisions of the inheritance law that would open the door to paying compensation to “terrorists.” Sixteen of their peers criticized Labour's proposals paper On Wednesday, it was published by think tank The Policy Exchange.
Northern Ireland Secretary Hilary Benn last month officially began the process of reforming the policies of the previous Conservative administration. heritage law, This was rejected by political parties in the region, victims, human rights groups and the Irish government.
Benn said Sections 46 and 47 of the law – relating to detention orders for Adams and others detained in detention, or detained without trial – should be repealed because they were found in court to be illegal.
But Policy Exchange argued that Labor had not previously opposed the rulings and that paying compensation of this nature would be “an extremely poor use of scarce public funds at a time of national economic crisis”.
Addressing Prime Minister's Questions, Conservative Leader Kemi Badenoch described such a prospect as “shameful”.
Conservative MP Julian Smith, a former Northern Ireland minister, urged Benn to “return to the previous cross-party position that we must prevent compensation payments to terrorists”.
Adams He led Republican Sinn Féin as the IRA's spokesman during the three-decade-long Troubles involving republican IRA paramilitaries, British loyalists and British security forces. He has always denied being in the IRA himself.
Adams criticized Starmer's comments. He said: “No one should be surprised that the British government seeks to evade its legal and human rights responsibilities.”
He said the Supreme Court ruling in 2020 was “frank.”
“Unauthorized temporary detention orders approved by the Secretary of State are unlawful. The British government accepted this. “It is a violation of the European Convention on Human Rights.”
But he added that there will “almost certainly” be more legal challenges when the legislation is changed.
The row erupted the day after Adams, 76, was scheduled to stand trial next year in England as part of a civil case brought by victims of the IRA bombings who are seeking a symbolic £1 compensation in a case alleging he was a criminal. Leader of the Irish Republican Army.
One government official described the dispute over Articles 46 and 47 as “hypocritical” because the law would eliminate such civil suits along with investigations. The Labor Party pledged to restore it.
Adams' legal team in the case, scheduled to begin on March 9, 2026, is headed by Richard Hermer, the British Attorney General.
The dispute over potential damages arose after Adams in 2020 successfully appealed convictions for trying to evade arrest in 1973 and 1974.
The High Court ruled that the Interim Custody Order (ICO) used to imprison him was invalid because it had not been signed by then Secretary of State Willie Whitelaw. It is believed that between 300 and 400 people are in a similar situation.
However, former Northern Ireland Secretary Lord Kean told BBC Radio Ulster that the practice of allowing junior ministers or senior officials to sign off on such orders dates back to the 1940s under the Carltona Doctrine.
“In a sense, this isn't really about Gerry Adams, it's about restoring clarity to the law and ensuring the restoration of something that was entrenched in the procedures of our government and our constitutional practices,” he said.
Starmer defended plans to scrap the inheritance law, saying it was “inappropriate”, not least because it would have provided “immunity to hundreds of terrorists…” . . “We will create a better framework.”
