The Ulster Unionist Party has today responded to the unanimous judgment of the UK Supreme Court in the Dillon case, which concerned the lawfulness of the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023 and the use of the Windsor Framework to strike down Acts of Parliament.

Ulster Unionist Peer and Party Chair Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard said:

“Today's unanimous Supreme Court ruling is a significant constitutional correction, but it also raises questions on this Labour government's handling of legacy from the moment it took office.

“The Supreme Court has been clear: the Belfast courts had no business disapplying Acts of the Westminster Parliament using the Windsor Framework, and the ICRIR was never the institutional failure the Court of Appeal claimed it to be. Those are important findings and we welcome them.

“But let us be equally clear about what Labour surrendered before this case even reached the Supreme Court. When Lord Hermer became Attorney General in 2024, he advised abandoning the human rights grounds of the appeal before the Court of Appeal had even ruled. As a result, some provisions of the 2023 Act remain formally incompatible with the European Convention not because the Supreme Court found them wanting, but because the government never gave it the chance to say otherwise. A man who spent his career taking cases against the British state was handed the task of defending veterans' protections and walked away from the argument.

“The Northern Ireland Veterans Movement, represented by Lord Wolfson, tried to put the reconciliation exception before the Supreme Court. The Court pointed out it could not act because the Secretary of State had already left the field. Thousands of veterans of Operation Banner deserved better than that.

“Meanwhile the Secretary of State Hilary Benn's replacement legislation is so unworkable it needed a parliamentary carry-over motion just weeks ago to stop it collapsing entirely. And Dublin's inter-state case grinds on despite the Irish government having secured every concession it asked for in last September's Joint Framework. That case should be withdrawn. The silence from this government on that question is telling.

“Today's ruling is welcome. The government should have fought harder to earn it.”