- Event type: CREATE_FROM
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 12559: 1991-05-09 07:00:00
Conclusions from bilateral meetings on 9 May are considered and compiled by the Chairman before being presented to the other delegations.
Document View:
Location of Strand 2: Meeting with Unionist Delegations to Discuss Government Proposal (9 May 12:18)
(Showing state at moment e826805)Arrangements for the Talks - Meeting with the Unionist Delegations on 9 May 12:18
Strand 3:
Any agreed outcome could only be implemented by the two Governments and it was thus necessary to devise a means of presenting the views of others. The issue of how views would be presented in the third strand should be cleared up now. It would be impossible to do that without talking to the Irish Government and that conversation would have implications for any suggestions about the venue of Strand 2. The Unionists wished Strand 3 to be concluded in London; against the background of the proposal that strand two should be held in a neutral country the Irish might well take the view that a substantial part of the third strand should take place in Dublin.
Unionists were not ruling out Dublin as a location for meetings of the third strand; they were simply saying that the final meeting had to be in London.
Strand 2:
The Unionist position was that the Secretary of State should chair Strand 2.
General Approach to Negotiations:
It was not sensible to proceed and only to allow disagreement at the very end.
Decisions yet to be taken
- Location of Strand 2: Meeting with Unionist Delegations to Discuss Government Proposal (9 May 12:18) (introduced on 1991-05-09 07:00:00 - CREATE_FROM - e826805) [This document] [This moment shown]
Document Timeline
- Location of Strand 2: Meeting with Unionist Delegations to Discuss Government Proposal (9 May 12:18) (introduced on 1991-05-09 07:00:00 - CREATE_FROM - e826805) [This document] [This moment shown] [view current proposal at this moment]