On October 14, 2025, the United Kingdom’s long-running struggle to reckon with the legacy of the Northern Ireland Troubles entered a new and complex phase. In a day marked by both legal drama and political maneuvering, the UK Supreme Court heard arguments over the controversial 2023 Legacy Act, while in Westminster, Labour’s newly installed Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Hilary Benn, introduced legislation aimed at finally replacing the much-criticized law.
The 2023 Legacy Act, passed by the previous Conservative government, brought an abrupt end to police investigations and inquests into Troubles-era incidents—those violent decades that scarred Northern Ireland from the late 1960s to the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. Instead, the Act established the Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery (ICRIR) to oversee unresolved cases. But as reported by BBC, the Act’s approach was almost universally condemned by Northern Ireland’s main political parties, the Irish government, and victims’ groups alike.
Legal challenges quickly followed. Within days of the Act’s introduction, more than 20 cases were launched, including those brought by victims’ families such as Martina Dillon, John McEvoy, Brigid Hughes, and Lynda McManus—each personally affected by the Troubles’ violence. In February 2024, the High Court in Belfast found that key provisions of the Act, especially those granting conditional immunity to perpetrators who cooperated with the ICRIR, breached victims’ rights. The government chose not to appeal the immunity ruling but pressed on with appeals regarding other aspects, particularly those relating to the Windsor Framework—a post-Brexit agreement that, among other things, guarantees that rights enshrined by the Good Friday Agreement cannot be diminished in Northern Ireland.
Both the High Court and the Northern Ireland Court of Appeal (NICA) found that the Legacy Act was incompatible with human rights and, crucially, with the Windsor Framework. The NICA ruled that the Act amounted to a “diminution” of victims’ rights and that a government veto over the disclosure of sensitive material to bereaved families was unlawful. The government, however, was undeterred: it brought the case to the UK Supreme Court, with its barristers calling the hearing “constitutionally profound.” In written submissions, Sir James Eadie KC, representing the government, argued that the NICA “failed to grapple with the legal analysis required of it,” insisting that the Windsor Framework was never intended to constrain Parliament so broadly. He also defended the veto over sensitive information, saying it was “not objectionable in principle, or incompatible,” as it was designed to protect national security.
Victims’ representatives and human rights organizations, however, strongly disagreed. John Larkin KC, for the victims, asserted that the courts’ findings were “plainly correct” and that the ICRIR was “structurally incapable of ensuring that the next of kin or victim must be involved in the procedure to the extent necessary to safeguard his or her legitimate interests.” Amnesty International UK, represented by Monye Anyadike-Danes KC, argued that legacy investigations “constitute an especially grave and complex category of investigations requiring the procedural features the NICA identified as lacking to ensure effectiveness.” She pointed to “extensive evidence of systematic state perpetration and collusion in gross human rights violations” and ongoing efforts to conceal such actions.
While the Supreme Court deliberated, Hilary Benn was on the floor of the House of Commons, taking what he called the “first formal step” toward fundamental reform. As BBC reported, Benn introduced a new bill to implement a legacy framework agreed by the UK and Ireland the previous month. Labour’s plan, fulfilling a promise to repeal and replace the Conservative law, includes the creation of a new legacy commission, a dedicated legacy unit within An Garda Síochána (the Irish police), and a package of protections for veterans. Benn emphasized that victims and their families would “ultimately be the judge” of these reforms.
Yet, the new proposals were met with skepticism from across the political spectrum. MPs criticized the government for debating the issue before the full text of the legislation was available. Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) leader Gavin Robinson called the process “disgraceful,” and Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) leader Jim Allister complained that the plan “still requires nothing meaningful from the Republic of Ireland.” Allister demanded a public apology from the Irish government for its alleged role in facilitating terrorism, a point the UK government did not address directly.
On the other side, Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) leader Claire Hanna insisted that “victims and their families must be at the centre of how this legislation is delivered. That includes the protection of hard-won inquests.” The new legislation restores nine inquests halted under the previous Act and sets up a process for reviewing 24 more. Notably, it will allow the resumption of an inquest into the 1987 deaths of eight IRA men and a civilian killed by the SAS in Loughgall, County Armagh—a case long seen as emblematic of the Troubles’ unresolved pain.
Protections for veterans, a politically sensitive issue, are also central to the new bill. The proposed safeguards mean that former police officers and army veterans cannot be compelled to travel to Northern Ireland to give evidence, and they will receive legal protections for old age and from cold calling. The government has insisted that these protections will not extend to paramilitaries.
Meanwhile, Ireland’s Deputy Prime Minister Simon Harris welcomed the UK’s move, saying his government would introduce complementary legislation in 2026, once the British law is in place. “We never wanted to be in a position where we had to take our nearest neighbour to an international court,” Harris remarked, expressing hope that the new joint framework would put both countries on a better path.
One particularly contentious aspect of the new legislation is its provision to block compensation claims by Gerry Adams and others interned without trial in the 1970s. Adams, whose convictions for attempted prison break-outs were quashed by the UK Supreme Court in 2020 on procedural grounds, accused the government of “hypocrisy and duplicity.” He argued, “Today, at the stroke of a pen what was illegal five decades ago has been made legal as the British state changes the rules to suit its own agenda and protect its own military personnel.” The previous Act had already retrospectively validated the interim custody orders (ICOs) that detained Adams and others, but a 2024 High Court ruling found this incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights. While the government did not appeal that decision, Benn pledged to find a lawful way to block payouts. The new bill is expected to reaffirm the so-called Carltona principle into law, which ministers believe will prevent any compensation being paid to former internees.
As the Supreme Court prepares to rule on the constitutional questions raised by the Legacy Act, and as Parliament debates the shape of the future framework, the struggle over how to address the legacy of the Troubles remains as fraught and sensitive as ever. The coming months will reveal whether the new reforms can deliver the “fundamental change” long demanded by victims, or whether old wounds will continue to frustrate reconciliation and justice in Northern Ireland.
