Gerry Adams could be in line for 'pay day from taxpayer', says report
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Former Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams is in line for "a pay day from the taxpayer" as the government plans to remove a block on former Troubles internees getting compensation, a report has claimed. Currently, the law blocks him and others interned without trial in the 1970s from claiming compensation for unlawful detention.
But the Policy Exchange thinktank has criticised the government's plans to lift the ban in a report backed by 16 peers, including shadow attorney general Lord Wolfson KC. Labour have started the process of repealing the Legacy Act and said the previous Conservative government's approach to the Troubles' legacy was "almost universally opposed in Northern Ireland".
In 2020, a Supreme Court judgement paved the way for Mr Adams to receive damages after he successfully appealed convictions for two attempted prison breaks after he was interned without trial in 1973. The Supreme Court ruled his detention was unlawful because the interim custody order (ICO) used to initially detain him had not been "considered personally" by then secretary of state for Northern Ireland Willie Whitelaw.
The previous Conservative government argued the ICOS was lawful due to a convention known as the Carltona principle, where officials and junior ministers routinely act in the name of the secretary of state. However, a clause was inserted into the Legacy Act that stopped payouts to Mr Adams and about 400 other people interned in similar error.
