National conflicts revolve around law, order and justice

The late Queen's University academic Frank Wright wrote: "National conflicts, once fully developed, revolve around issues of law, order and justice". Disputes over and abuses around issues of law, order and justice have characterised the conflict in this island.

The treatment of detainees, parading routes, the use of force . . . a moment's thought will convey the validity of Frank Wright's thesis and its centrality to the Good Friday agreement.

Issues of law, order and justice are at the heart of the agreement. They are its lifeblood. They were given particular institutional expression through the Independent Commission on Policing, the Criminal Justice Review, the Equality Commission and the Human Rights Commission. The intention of these structures is to move our conflict "away from the bloodlines of ethnicity to the lifelines of human rights".

Most media and public attention has inevitably spotlighted the Patten report on policing. This is understandable. The achievement of policing with consent and government with consent would be an enduring prize.

However, the work of the Criminal Justice Review, Equality Commission and Human Rights Commission will also be profoundly significant.

A particular responsibility falls on the last of these. It has had a difficult birth. It was perceived as a threat by many unionists, who viewed the rights agenda as in the ownership of nationalism rather than an opportunity for all.

Its work has not been given the respect it deserves at certain times by certain elements in government, police and others involved in the administration of justice. Indeed, there is a concern that its future workings, if not membership, is going to be unduly and unreasonably influenced by political constraints, not human rights imperatives.

The commission, nonetheless, continues its work, not least its task of consulting over and making recommendations for a Bill of Rights for the North. The commission is currently consulting in order to develop rights supplementary to the Human Rights Act, which incorporates the European Convention on Human Rights into domestic law.

It will forward its conclusions to the Secretary of State to be, one hopes, enacted as Westminster legislation, though the response of the British government to the Patten report has created doubts.

The SDLP is shortly to submit a substantial contribution to the Bill of Rights process and will support an expansive instrument which reflects the particular circumstances of the North.

The commission must not be deflected from its work by those who are suspicious of the human rights agenda in general and of a Bill of Rights to include economic, social, cultural and community rights issues in particular.

However, the agreement does not look within the North alone on the protection of rights. The agreement envisages, at least, equivalence in relation to the protection of rights on this island.

With this in mind there is provision for a Joint Committee of the Northern and Southern Rights Commissions which will act as a forum for considering the human rights of everyone. One matter for its consideration is a possible Charter of Rights.

Once the southern commission is fully operational the swift establishment of this committee and a strong commitment from both commissions to its success is necessary. In particular, it is essential work begins on the charter soon.

The joint committee must also act as a forum for considering how the Bill of Rights process in the North will respect the agreement's commitment to all-island human rights protection. This has not as yet received the attention it deserves.

Mary Robinson, the UN High Commissioner, said in Belfast two years ago that the wider world was most interested in the rights provision of the Good Friday agreement. This arises from the fact that disputes over rights and the abuse of rights is central to conflicts around the world. This is an added reason why we must get the protection of rights enhanced and enshrined in the island.

We have a responsibility not only to ourselves but to those elsewhere, who also struggle for their rights. The respective Human Rights Commissions, North and South, offer mechanisms to achieve this goal. The current drafting of a Bill of Rights for the North and a future Charter of Rights on the island must deliver the provisions of rights protection for all in Ireland.

As with policing and criminal justice reform, all on the island, not least the respective governments, must ensure that "our new world is not made in the image of the old". This is how we should be judged and judge ourselves if the values and vision of the Good Friday agreement are to be fulfilled.

The conference opens in the Springvale Training Centre, Spring field Road, Belfast, at 10 a.m.