Posted: 04 April 2008
Taoiseach marks 10th Anniversary of Good Friday Agreement
Speech by the Taoiseach, Mr. Bertie Ahern, T.D. to the Institute for British-Irish Studies (IBIS) Conference “From Conflict to Consensus: the Legacy of the Good Friday Agreement” at University College Dublin on Thursday, 3 April, 2008 at 11am
I am delighted to have been invited to address you here today at the Institute of British-Irish Studies as we celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement.
It is appropriate that we use these days to reflect on what has been achieved and to articulate a vision for the future.
The 10th of April, 1998 stands out as a watershed in our history.
It was in some ways an ending – an end to sustained conflict and the culmination of long and intensive negotiations.
It also marked a new beginning – a new era of peace and mutual respect.
The negotiations leading up to the Agreement took place against a backdrop of sectarian murders and political discord.
The spate of killings - and in particular the murders in March 1998 of close friends Philip Allen and Damien Trainor in Poyntzpass - affected everyone deeply and brought home to all of us just how high the stakes were.
We faced enormous challenges – to remove the causes of conflict, to overcome the legacy of history and to heal the divisions of the past.
The only way this could be achieved was through a comprehensive Agreement taking into account the totality of relationships on these islands and taking on the big institutional issues that for so long had caused such alienation.
We also needed a new ethos – an ethos of tolerance, reconciliation, equality and mutual respect - to underpin that Agreement.
Many of the commitments made in the Agreement involved taking difficult decisions in the white heat of negotiation in the final days leading up to the 10th of April, 1998.
They involved difficult choices for the negotiators, having to accept unpalatable elements of the agreement in recognition of their importance to others.
Some elements - especially the early release of prisoners - were deeply painful at a personal level for those who had lost loved ones in the conflict.
It was our collective best effort, and in that spirit, we recommended it to the people, North and South.
We had of course huge resources of leadership.
Some of those who were central to the process are no longer with us – Mo Mowlam and David Ervine made enormous contributions and are sadly missed.
John Hume and David Trimble, who led their negotiating teams, took enormous risks for peace and were rightly honoured as Nobel Peace Prize winners.
Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness showed great leadership in bringing their movement with them, first to the negotiating table and ultimately to the centre of the new power-sharing administration in Belfast.
In later years, Dr Ian Paisley, Peter Robinson and others in the DUP showed equal vision and leadership in negotiating, and then implementing, the St Andrews Agreement that led to the restoration of the institutions and the hugely positive situation we all enjoy today.
President Clinton gave us Senator George Mitchell who was with us every step of the way. The President also gave much of his personal time, as did his successor President Bush, their special envoys and their administrations.
International support for the process, including through the EU and the International Fund for Ireland, was and continues to be vital.
And of course, John Alderdice, Monica McWilliams, General De Chastelain and many others have continued to make significant contributions in various capacities right up to the present day.
In the period up to 1998, we were fortunate to build on foundations laid by our predecessors over many years – notably John Major and Albert Reynolds who helped bring about the IRA ceasefire in 1994.
And perhaps most importantly of all, in Tony Blair I had a partner as British Prime Minister who was prepared to work tirelessly for many years to settle our age old question.
The framework we achieved in 1998 was truly comprehensive.
It is worth recalling here that the full range of commitments agreed included:
- constitutional change for both Britain and Ireland;
- inclusive power-sharing institutions in Northern Ireland; and
- the establishment of the North-South Ministerial Council, the North/South implementation Bodies, the British–Irish Council and the British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference.
There were also crucial provisions relating to human rights, the transformation of policing and the criminal justice system, the decommissioning of arms, the normalisation of security arrangements and prisoner releases.
A crucial element was measures to promote reconciliation and addressing the needs of the victims of violence.
While many of the obligations have been fully implemented over the past ten years, the solemn obligations to pursue reconciliation and to help victims remain ongoing by their very nature.
They will remain at the core of our future work.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I can well recall Senator Mitchell noting that there would have to be a lot of effort, in good faith, for a long time, to achieve the goals of this Agreement.
In the intervening years, there have been those breakthrough days which attracted the newspaper headlines and which will be written about in the history books.
There were many important moments, which hold a special place in our collective memory, culminating on that famous, historic day in May of 2007 when Dr Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness took office in Stormont.
Before that, there were many other days when, without fanfare or publicity, the process of building trust, developing relationships and changing attitudes took place.
This took weeks, months and years of quiet work by ordinary people on all sides - slowly, painstakingly and steadfastly creating the space in which old enemies could come together and take forward the process of peacemaking and reconciliation.
As the Troubles recede into history, we can see more clearly the quiet work that went on for decades, both before and after 1998.
We are profoundly grateful to all of those who worked, and who still work every day, for peace and reconciliation.
In the bleaker times during the past ten years, when progress was slow or things appeared to be moving backwards, it was important to remind ourselves of why we were there.
The strongest motivator was the knowledge that the implementation of the Agreement was what the people of the island wanted.
The resounding endorsement – North and South - in the referendums which took place after the Agreement, underlined to all parties involved that an inclusive approach, underpinned by mutual respect and forsaking all forms of violence, was what the people desperately wanted.
It was a particularly proud moment for me as Taoiseach when the referendum here in this jurisdiction was carried by a majority of over 90%.
That decisive result confirmed the openness and the willingness of the Irish people to commit to new arrangements that would take account of all traditions and viewpoints, on the basis of fairness and equality.
They did so because they appreciated that the provisions of the Agreement were balanced.
It was a fair deal.
So much has been achieved since 1998.
The inclusive power-sharing institutions in Northern Ireland, the Assembly and Executive, are now working to address the day-to-day concerns of the people.
A key moment was the recent agreement on the Budget, Programme for Government and Investment Strategy.
The North-South Ministerial Council and North/South implementation Bodies are now back operating fully.
Following the Patten Commission and Criminal Justice Review, the policing and the criminal justice system in Northern Ireland have been transformed.
With Sinn Féin giving its full support to the Police Service of Northern Ireland, there is now a fully accountable police service, serving the community and increasingly representative of the community.
These changes did not happen by chance but rather, because the Patten Commission did an excellent job and the Governments and the political parties – especially the SDLP – worked to ensure that its recommendations were implemented.
Crucially, and after many years of arduous negotiations, in 2005 the IRA formally ended its campaign of violence and the independent decommissioning body verified that it had decommissioned the ‘totality of its arms’.
Ten years ago, Northern Ireland was scarred by heavily militarised barracks and watchtowers, many border roads remained closed, and there was a very large troop presence across the North.
Today, the physical landscape is transformed, the hardware of conflict is gone and the remaining troops are confined to barracks.
Throughout all of this process, the relationship between Britain and Ireland has been transformed from one of difficulty and disagreement to a vibrant modern relationship based on strong economic and cultural links and a shared vision for a peaceful future.
We are also continuing to develop the relationship with our nearest neighbours in a whole range of other ways, including through the British-Irish Council which was established under the Good Friday Agreement to foster East/West links.
Already, the Council has played a significant role in developing the relationships between all of the administrations on these islands.
I was honoured to host the recent Summit meeting in Dublin.
The venue - the Royal Hospital in Kilmainham – carried echoes of so much of our shared history, while the substance of the meeting showed a clear path to new and developing relationships for the future.
Of course, the attendance of leaders from Cardiff and Edinburgh were a clear reminder that the year 1998 saw more than one significant constitutional innovation.
As well as the Good Friday Agreement, that year also saw the devolution settlements in Scotland and Wales.
The future evolution of those devolved institutions will have important implications for everyone on these islands.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
At its heart, the Agreement was about securing lasting change in how the two traditions on this island live and interact with each other.
When we agreed the North South aspects of the Agreement, we envisaged a North-South Ministerial Council that had the capacity to make a difference and improve people’s lives, North and South.
That is why we wrote that participation in the Council would be “one of the essential responsibilities attaching to relevant posts in the two Administrations”. We reflected further on this at St. Andrew’s.
And we have since turned our good words into positive action, especially over the last few months.
I was proud to lead our Ministerial team at the North South Ministerial Council Plenary in July last year. It was the first occasion in over five years for Ministers on both sides to sit around a table together, and we had a genuinely open and wide-ranging discussion.
We had further wide-ranging discussions in Dundalk in February, including on issues that affect the all-island economy.
Already, we have seen significant new initiatives.
We are implementing a massive programme of joint investment in infrastructure, including a major new inter-urban road between Dublin and the North West as well as the route between Belfast and Larne. We also hope to see further improvements in the Dublin-Belfast rail service emerging from future meetings of Transport Ministers from North and South.