7. Closing Remarks by the Chair

Lady Hallett: Thank you all very much. That now completes our hearings in Belfast for Module 2C, core decision-making and political governance in Northern Ireland.

I hope that we’ve covered the most important issues under that heading thoroughly and rigorously. I know there are other issues of concern to the people of Northern Ireland, for example care homes, discharge of patients to care homes, test and trace, issues that we’ve only touched on during the course of this Inquiry, vaccines, use of do not resuscitate notices, but these are all issues, I can assure people, we shall cover in later modules in far more detail.

We shall also be exploring a large number of other issues, including a more detailed examination of the impact of the pandemic on the population of the United Kingdom, for example the impact on mental health.

So they are not issues that are being ignored; they are issues to which I shall return.

Having heard the oral evidence in this case and, as Ms Dobbin has just mentioned, I received the written evidence, I will now begin my analysis of all that material gathered by the Inquiry team.

I will then, if I can, conduct a comparative analysis with Modules 2, 2A and 2B. I don’t know the extent to which that will be possible, because I was always warned to be wary of making comparisons unless you have exactly similar circumstances, but I will do my best if it is possible.

I also obviously wish to examine carefully the issues that are specific to Northern Ireland, just as there are issues specific to Scotland and issues specific to Wales, and I assure everybody, again, that I will cover those matters fully and fairly in my report.

The report will take some time, and I make no apologies for that, it’s too important to rush, and so I ask people to bear with us. I hope that we’ll be able to publish it as soon as possible, and I promise you the teams will be working extremely hard to make that possible.

I hope too that I’ll be able to include in it recommendations that will make the system stronger and better able to withstand the challenge of a national civil emergency on the scale of the Covid-19 pandemic.

I know it is important to all those who have suffered that we do make – that I do make recommendations and that they are implemented as soon as possible, because they hope to reduce the suffering of others in the future.

I should like to thank the bereaved families and everyone else who suffered, and all those who have contributed to these hearings: the material providers, the witnesses, the core participants, and of course the Inquiry team, both front of stage and backstage, including our technical team behind their wall of blue.

I believe that it was worth what is, I’m afraid, quite a large cost in bringing – in preparing for the hearings and in bringing the hearings to Belfast. But, as I’ve always said, this is a UK-wide inquiry, it is not a London/Westminster-specific inquiry.

I hope that my feelings are shared by the people of Northern Ireland, that it was worth bringing the Inquiry here, and I particularly I hope that the bereaved feel that it was worth it. Some of them have been present throughout, and thank you for your constant support, but I know that many others have been following online, and I thank them too.

I would also like to thank the people of Northern Ireland for the warmth of their welcome; and yes, Ms Campbell, we have found it to be a very warm welcome.

So thank you all very much indeed. I think the next main hearings will not now be until the autumn, although there are many other preliminary hearings to be considered before then.

Thank you.

Ms Brenda Doherty: Baroness Hallett, can I just thank you for coming to Northern Ireland, because it has meant a lot to us families (inaudible) travel to London. So for a lot of the people that you’ve seen here every day, we wouldn’t get to London, so thank you for coming to Northern Ireland, we really appreciate it.

Lady Hallett: Thank you for saying that.

(12.31 pm)

(The hearing concluded)