- Event type: CREATE
Northern Ireland Brooke/Mayhew Talks 1991-1992
WORK IN PROGRESS - IN THE FINAL STAGES OF EDITING A series of talks launched by Peter Brooke, Secretary of State for Northern in Ireland, which began in April 1991, and were carried on intermittently by Brooke and his successor, Patrick Mayhew, until November 1992.
Office of the Strand 1 Chairman (British Government Delegation)
In order to adequately reflect the role of the Chairman and his staff in re-drafting documents and controlling the flow of information during bilateral negotiations, we are representing them as a separate committee. In contrast to other Quill negotiations, in these Talks much of the actual work of negotiation and making proposals took place in bilateral meetings between the Chairman and the party delegations. The minutes of these sessions have been preserved in the same format as the minutes of the plenary sessions, and the sessions are modelled from the minutes as separate Committees (British Government/Alliance Bilaterals, etc.). The Chairman would move between these meetings, reporting on the positions of the other delegations and trying to reach accommodation. It is beyond the scope of the current project to model all the internal government meetings which took place during the Talks (although documentation for at least some of them exists in the National Archives), but we can draw on evidence within the sources we are using to show that proposals and agendas for the bilaterals were agreed within the Government team. For example, in a particular round of meetings, the Chairman will open the meeting with a near-identical agenda and summary of the current position of the other parties. To adequately model the fact that the flow of ideas between the delegations was filtered by the Chairman in this way, we have set up a committee called the 'Office of the Chairman' to show the conclusions of each bilateral discussion passing through the Chairman's Office and being redrafted before being passed on to the next delegation.
To see the full record of a committee, click on the corresponding committee on the map below.
Session 12474: 1991-05-08 07:00:00
Conclusions from bilateral meetings on 7 May and 8 May are considered and compiled by the Chairman before being presented to the other delegations.
Document View:
Position of Parties on the Morning of 8 May
Starting Position for the Discussion of Strand 2 Location on 8 May
Full party delegations should be invited to attend the bilateral meetings.
Party Positions:
- The Alliance position was flexible, they had a preference for Belfast on grounds of practicality but would agree to whatever venue was acceptable to the other parties;
- The SDLP would accept a situation of alternation starting with London and moving back to the island of Ireland. Their first preference on the island was Dublin but for symbolic purposes would accept Armagh;
- The Unionist position was an insistence in principle on a GB location for Strand Two, preferably near to London. They would be prepared to contemplate a meeting late in Strand Two on the island but not in the Republic and not at Stormont. There was some fuzziness about visiting Dublin late in the process, perhaps in Strand Three, but this had not been clarified;
- The Irish Government's position as of the previous week was that the first meeting of Strand Two should be on the island of Ireland (not necessarily Dublin) and then alternating between London and Dublin, the initial venue to be decided by tossing a coin.
Decisions yet to be taken
Document Timeline
- Position of Parties on the Morning of 8 May (introduced on 1991-05-08 07:00:00 - CREATE - e823292) [This document]
[view current proposal at this moment]
- None (introduced on 1991-05-08 07:00:00 - REPORT_PROPOSAL - e823295) [view current proposal at this moment]