Written evidence submitted by Jane Donaldson, relating to the Government’s new approach to addressing the legacy of the past in Northern Ireland 

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1.Introduction

My name is Jane Donaldson and I write on behalf of my own family about our lived experience of the conflict in Northern Ireland.  I would like to respond to the call for evidence by the Northern Ireland Affair’s Committee about the Government’s approach to the legacy of the conflict and dealing with the past. 

I am not a victims’ campaigner nor am I a politician. My family and I are entirely independent of any victims group or political party. Unlike others who may submit evidence to the Committee, I do not purport to speak for anyone else. I have not spoken with anyone else except my own family about my submission. However, I believe the experience of my family and me speaks to significant flaws in the approach to dealing with the legacy of the past conflict.  In the hope of illustrating to Committee members how and why the approach to legacy by the Government does not meet the needs of all victims, survivors and families, I draw on my lived experience. I also offer Committee members some ideas on a new, inclusive, human rights compliant, and traumainformed way forward to addressing, once and for all, the legacy of our conflict.

2. Engagement with victims of the conflict

Firstly, I welcome the opportunity to respond to this Committee inquiry. Since my father was murdered almost 19 years ago, no Minister from the British Government or the Irish Government has ever agreed to meet with my family to hear about our ordeal. On the contrary, Government Ministers who profess to be engaging with victims about a way forward on the legacy cases have repeatedly ignored and rejected my requests to meet. 

After his appointment, the Northern Ireland Secretary of State Hilary Benn, MP, said that he would be undertaking a new round of engagement and consultation with victims of the conflict. Therefore, I wrote to Mr Benn twice (30.07.24; 09.09.24) to request a meeting with him to discuss this subject and how my own family’s experience might inform his proposals for legacy going forward. On 24 October 2024, Mr Benn replied to reject my request for a meeting (see Appendix A).  Over recent years, and at regular intervals since April 2021 until last September, I have written to Irish Government Ministers also asking for a meeting to discuss my father’s case, my family’s ordeal, and the public interest issues to which it gives rise. Again, my requests have been rebuffed (See Appendix B). This refusal to engage with my family and me has extended to the

Garda Commissioner who refused my request to meet on the basis of advice that meeting with my family may cause prejudice to decisions by the Director of Public Prosecutions (see Appendix C). I do not accept that any of the repeated refusals to engage with my family about my father’s case have a sounds basis, nor are they consistent with Victims Directive or a trauma-informed approach to inclusive engagement on a legacy policy. 

Therefore, I respectfully make this submission in the hope that my evidence may be accepted and considered by the Committee in formulating its own recommendations.

Before elaborating on my response to questions being explored by this inquiry, I would like to share a summary with the Committee of the criminal conspiracy which led to my father’s exposure and murder, and my family’s ordeal since that time. In restating this sequence of events to set my submission in context, I have no expectation that Committee members will enquire further into the detail. Nonetheless, it is an important context for the evidence which I give to this inquiry on legacy issues.

3.  Deconstructing the hierarchy of victims

Speaking at Queens University Belfast to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, Senator George Mitchell acknowledged that at least 164 people have murdered since the 10th April 1998[1]. Inviting those present to stand, Senator Mitchell called for a minute of silence to remember all of those who lost their lives during our conflict. He did not differentiate between those murdered before 10th April 1998 and those murdered after that date. In fact, the Good Friday / Belfast Agreement which Senator Mitchell helped to bring to fruition said nothing about the definition of victims of the conflict being constrained to those who were murdered up to the day of its publication. A close examination of the Good Friday / Belfast Agreement[2] reveals nothing to support the exclusion of families who have been bereaved from the 11th April 1998 onwards. In fact, I submit to the Committee that since many elements of the Good Friday / Belfast Agreement remained outstanding, and took many years to introduce, it is inconsistent with the spirit and intent of the Good Friday / Belfast Agreement to exclude families bereaved through conflict-related violence from acknowledgement and support by both Governments and others in society. Moreover, I contend that the stated goal of the Good Friday / Belfast Agreement to facilitate a process of reconciliation is made unattainable unless an inclusive, respectful and traumainformed approach is adopted towards all victims of the conflict, including my family. Yet, the new Northern Ireland Secretary of State wrote to me (24 October 2024) to say: “… the (Legacy) Act does not make provision for victim like your father. The Government does not intend to widen the scope of the Act, which would enable your father’s murder

to be considered by the Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery (ICRIR), and any investigative responsibilities do remain with the authorities in the Republic of Ireland.” (Appendix A). No rationale or justification for this exclusion has been offered, the impact of which is to reinforce a hierarchy of victims in our society.

4.  Victim-centred, human rights compliant, trauma-informed information recovery.

It is important to set some context for my evidence to the Committee on this topic. On Saturday 10th December 2005, my father Denis Donaldson received a visit at home in west Belfast from a police officer. The officer handed my father a PM1 threat notice (see Appendix D). This warned him that he was about to be exposed as an informer. It is important to state that the stimulus for the PM1 threat notice to my father, which triggered a calamitous chain of circumstances, is one which I believe is not fully explained or accounted for. Five days later, he left his home in Belfast with my mother. 

On 16th December 2005, Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams convened a press conference in Dublin to announce to the assembled media that my father had been expelled from Sinn Féin for being an informer. Two hours later, at a nearby hotel in the same city, my father gave an interview to RTE journalist Charlie Bird. That interview was set up by Sinn Féin and my father sat next to his solicitor as he read out a prepared statement.

In March 2022, the Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland (PONI) published a report[3] into a complaint by my family about the criminal conspiracy to expose and murder my father. Part of that report refers to the PM1 delivered to my father on 10 December 2005. It is claimed that PONI investigators “located a document, originating from early December 2005, which stated that a journalist had been informed that Mr Donaldson was an informant.” (PONI, March 2022, pg.28). The origin or veracity of this “document”, or indeed where or how it was “located” is not explained in the PONI’s report. Indeed, this account of events has been called into question. Former BBC security correspondent Brian Rowan has repeatedly questioned the veracity of the PM1 threat notice to my father on 10 December 2005: “I do not believe any journalist had that information (in the PM1 threat notice) … He (Denis Donaldson) was not about to revealed in the media.” 4

Furthermore, correspondence has been undertaken by my family and our solicitors with many statutory agencies about the criminal conspiracy to expose and murder my father. Among these was correspondence received from the Public Prosecution Service (20.07.2017) about a file linked to PONI’s investigation. My family was informed that a decision had been made to direct no prosecution against those named in the PONI file.

These individuals in question were said in PONI’s report to have been the origin or ‘stimulus’ for the issues of the PM1 threat notice to my father. 

Significantly, the PPS also revealed that the PONI enquiries were “unable to obtain evidence substantiating the allegation in this case. The source of the allegation against the retired officer was relaying his recollection of information that he had received many years earlier. He was not able to give any direct evidence in relation to the issue, i.e. his account was hearsay. The PONI enquiries also established a real possibility that the recollection of the person making the allegation was flawed.” (see Appendix E).

I accept that the PSNI officer who delivered the PM1 threat notice to my father was following proper procedure, in compliance with Article 2 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR). However, like Mr Brian Rowan, I do not believe “members of the media” were about to expose my father as an informer. The account offered in the PONI report is incomplete and cannot be reconciled with the account from the PPS. In fact, the correspondence from PPS has given my family strong grounds for disbelieving the version of events offered by PONI in relation to the PM1 delivered to my father. 

As a result, my family and I believe that the origin or source of the leak which led the PSNI to issue the PM1 threat notice has yet to be identified. We believe that statutory agencies hold other information, not yet shared with my family, which could shed further light on the facts of the matter. Insofar as this Committee inquiry is examining the efficacy of existing or proposed methods for information recovery, my family’s experience shows the challenges which continue to prevail. Even after a 15 year long investigation by PONI, there are contradictions which exist between the information held and seen by different statutory agencies, and the parts which they are willing to share with my family. It cannot fall to bereaved families, like mine, to be required to triangulate correspondence with reports in order to uncover discrepancies between the information different statutory agencies are willing to share. This also underscores the importance of effective representation for, and complete involvement of, next of kin in any future legacy investigations. The experience of my family up to this point is that statutory agencies guard against information sharing with bereaved families. 

The PONI narrative around the origin and source of the PM1 threat notice issued to my father was shared with the same State Agencies who were at the centre of my family’s grievance, before it was shared with my family. In effect, the narrative had been agreed between all of the Statutory Agencies with PONI, before the report was presented to my family. No opportunity for questioning discrepancies and requesting further information, as highlighted, was afforded to my family at the close of the PONI report. 

This is a matter which I hope the Committee will consider in making its own recommendations. So too is the need for any new information recovery processes to be able to compel evidence and information from Statutory Agencies in the republic of Ireland, and potentially elsewhere, including the United States of America. 

4. Cross-jurisdictional human rights compliance in information recovery.

On 4 April 2006, I learned that my father had been murdered from the television news. There was no attempt by the Irish Government or by An Garda Siochana to contact my family before the news was broadcast [4]. Instead, Irish Government Minister for Justice at that time went live on RTE news to describe the nature of my father’s injuries, suggesting to the media that he had been tortured and his body mutilated before being murdered [5]. As stated earlier in this submission, no Irish Government Minister has ever been willing to meet with my family and me despite numerous requests. 

The cross-jurisdictional issues of information recovery and human rights compliance are problems which families other than mine face. Most recently, this was highlighted once again by families of the victims of the Omagh Bomb [6]. The need for crossjurisdictional co-operation, especially on the island of Ireland, was also underlined in an interview given recently by the Chairperson of the ICRIR Sir Declan Morgan [7]. The problem is that the current arrangements outside of the Legacy Act, and within its provisions, leave too much discretion in the hands of State Agencies in the republic of Ireland. That fact is illustrated most graphically through my family’s lived experience.

After my father was murdered in April 2006, and An Garda Siochana had completed the forensic examination, the scene of crime was handed back to my family. Along with this was an inventory of items recovered by Gardaí which would be returned to my family after forensic inquiries had been completed. A journal in which my father had been writing up to the time of his murder was initially not mentioned in the inventory.  In July 2006, three months after the murder of my father, An Garda Siochana came to meet my family in the offices of our solicitor in Belfast. A Garda Detective Inspector told us that the omission of my father’s journal from the inventory had been an error. He advised that the journal was in the office desk of the local Garda Chief Inspector in Glenties and that arrangements would be made to return it to my family at the earliest opportunity. 

Since that time, my family have repeatedly restated our legitimate expectation that the promise given to return my father’s journal would be honoured by An Garda Siochana. This journal constitutes part of my father’s personal estate and is of sentimental value

given that it contains his final words. It is also an item which my family contends may hold clues about the circumstances surrounding the criminal conspiracy which lead to the exposure and murder of my father.  For 19 years, my family’s requests for access to, a copy of, or the final return of my father’s journal have been stonewalled by Gardai. 

On 11th August 2008, after Assistant Commissioner Derek Byrne was appointed to take over the Garda murder investigation, he wrote to my family to say that he had decided to retain the journal for “security reasons”. On 24th April 2012, at a meeting in my family’s solicitors offices in Belfast, Assistant Commissioner Derek Byrne told my family that Denis’s journal had “absolutely not” generated any leads for their investigation and that no arrests had been made on the basis of the journal. Assistant Commissioner Derek Byrne said:”If I was to try investigating some of the stuff in there, I’d have to go interviewing a lot of people. I haven’t done that. I’ve kept it”. Garda also confirmed that they had ‘raised actions’ which were given to the PSNI liaison officers to arrange for individuals in the north to be interviewed about the contents of Denis’ journal.

Before the Oireachtas (13th February 2019) the current Garda Commissioner Mr Harris told members of the Joint Committee on Justice and Equality "The journal contains information that we do not think should be in the public domain... ".

Mr Harris claimed: "It is of evidential value in an ongoing and legitimate enquiry. Beyond that, the journal contains information of a personal nature, not just related to Mr Donaldson and his family". 

Gardai have since stated in writing (14th July 2023) that the family's request has "recently been reviewed and the decision is to retain the journal". This "review" process has never been explained to my family or me, nor have we been afforded any assurance of its independence or the right to make formal representations on our own behalf.

Before publishing its report, PONI investigators told my family they had met with senior officers in An Garda Siochana, officials from the Department of Justice in Dublin and officials from unnamed State Intelligence organisations in the Republic of Ireland. Those present refused to afford PONI investigators direct access to my father’s journal as part of their investigation. Legal representations to PONI made on behalf of my family resulted in a commitment by the Police Ombudsman at that time (July 2017) to initiate an International Letter of Request (ILoR) through the PPS to the Irish authorities. In a later meeting with my family and legal representatives, the PPS confirmed that this ILoR had never been followed through. Gardai never handed over my father’s journal to PONI. 

A parallel complaint to Garda Siochana Ombudsman Commission (GSOC) on behalf of my family also stipulates the potential relevance of my father’s journal to that inquiry.  On 24 November 2024, GSOC wrote to my family to say that An Garda Siochana are

“asserting privilege over this time” and GSOC was being refused access to it. Therefore,

I respectfully submit that cross-jurisdictional information recovery must become compellable upon State Agencies and others in the republic of Ireland to be effective.

5. Inquests and their importance to bereaved families.

I welcome the examination of reopening of inquests as part of this inquiry by the Committee. The experience of my family and me is also adversely impacted by the cross-jurisdictional issues of public interest arising from my father’s murder. Although he lived his whole life in Belfast, and the conspiracy to expose him as an informer began there, he was murdered in Donegal in the neighbouring jurisdiction. This has meant that his inquest falls under the Coroners (1967) Act, which is not compliant with Article 2 ECHR. Since the preliminary hearing in my father’s inquest was opened in November

2007, the inquest proceedings have been adjourned at the request of An Garda Siochana on at least 27 consecutive occasions (see Appendix F). Legal submissions made on behalf of my family at inquest hearings have received no studied consideration or response by those present at hearings on behalf of the Irish Government and An Garda Siochana. No legal aid or financial support of any kind has been afforded to my family to have legal representations made on our behalf at inquest proceedings. No timetable for commencing the full inquest into the circumstance surrounding my father’s murder has been offered, or sought, by the Donegal County Coroner. Nor has any concession or commitment been given to the legal submissions on behalf of my family thirteen years ago (2012) that my father’s inquest needs to be Article 2 compliant.

I invite the Committee to look more closely at the asymmetry of inquest arrangements in both jurisdictions on the island of Ireland. I respectfully submit that it is a process of repeated, unwarranted and unwanted re-traumatisation to have an inquest process, like my father’s, extended inexorably into the future with occasional comment in the media. It is also dehumanising to my elderly mother, and to all those elderly who have been bereaved during the conflict, to witness statutory processes such as an inquest delayed with complete indifference to a person’s health and wellbeing in later years of life. 

Both the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission and the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission have commented in the past on my father’s inquest and continue to take an active interest in the human rights and public interest issues arising from it. (See Appendix G)

6. The role of both Governments.

I would encourage the Committee to examine what more can be done to ensure that both Governments, the British and the Irish government, and all statutory agencies and public authorities, agree a way forward on legacy cases which is consistently victim centred, human rights-based and trauma informed. I have read with interest the public comments by the Irish Government on this matter. I note the Irish Government set in motion legal proceedings on an inter-state basis because of its concern about the failure of the Legacy Act, in its view, to be compliant with Article 2 of the ECHR. However, my family and I have yet to witness a victim-centred, human rights based, trauma informed approach by the Irish Government, despite regarding ourselves as Irish citizens. For instance, in April 2021, a cross section of people of integrity in public life co-authored a letter in support of my family to the Minister of Justice in Dublin, copied to her counterpart the Minister for Justice in Belfast. The letter asked that the Minister consider establishing a Judge-Led Commission of Investigation, with a cross-border dimension, into the circumstances surrounding the criminal conspiracy to expose and murder my father (see Appendix H).  

The Minister for Justice in the Northern Ireland executive acknowledged receipt but said that she considered the request a matter of ‘national security’ and was referring the letter onto the Northern Ireland Office. Nothing further was received from that side. As for the Irish Minister of Justice, the letter requesting a Judge-Led Commission of Investigation was completely ignored. Only three and a half years later, in August 2024, did the Irish Minister of Justice finally reply to say that she was summarily rejecting the request and ignored the accompanying request to meet. (see Appendix I).

This evidence is shared to illustrate the credibility gap between what has been said by the Irish Government about the way forward on legacy issues and how families like mine have been treated. Both Governments are co-guarantors and co-signatories of the Good Friday / Belfast Agreement. In both jurisdictions, the ECHR has been enacted into law. Therefore, I respectfully submit to the Committee that any way forward on legacy issues should be consistent in both jurisdictions on this island, and across these islands. I share the experiences of my own family in the hope of encouraging reform.

Conclusion.

The Kenova report has already highlighted the unique experience of families whose loved ones were killed under the label of ‘informer’. I believe that investigation has already revealed more about how statutory processes and criminal investigations can help to rehumanise the experience of all bereaved families. My family is still waiting to be afforded an opportunity to participate in such a process of truth recovery. 

This is not limited to the British and Irish Governments. There are State Agencies and non-State organisations who have a culpability for harm and injustice done to families like mine. The differential treatment of one bereaved family versus another only serves to hinder reconciliation. The home from which my father fled in December 2005 within days of being exposed as an informer is within walking distance of where the agent Stakeknife is reputed to have lived for many years in west Belfast. While Stakeknife was safeguarded, sheltered and then shepherded away to a secure location, my father was thrown to the wolves. I would like that to be explained. I would like those State agencies and republican groups involved in such cases to publicly account for their actions. 

Truth in the recovery of information is only possible if there is evidence of honesty.

Without honesty, by individuals and institutions, how can we reconcile with the past?

February 2025

Appendix A. 

Correspondence to Northern Ireland Secretary of State

Correspondence from PPS 

Appendix F  - correspondence from Donegal County Coroner 

Appendix G  - Joint Statement by the NIHRC and IHREC, 5 May 2011.

Appendix H  - Request to Ministers for a Judge-Led Commission of Investigation

Appendix I  - Response from Irish Ministers of Justice

February 2025