Quill
  1. Overview: Northern Ireland Downing Street Joint Declaration (1993)
  2. Full Record: Northern Ireland Downing Street Joint Declaration (1993)
  3. Committee:Butler-Nally Meetings
  4. Friday, 10 September 1993, at 12:00

Northern Ireland Downing Street Joint Declaration (1993)

This project models the series of formal and informal negotiations which led to the publication, in December 1993, of a declaration issued jointly by the British and Irish Governments. The Joint Declaration was a critical policy document which paved the way for a ceasefire and the entry of Sinn Féin into formal talks. It also laid out a shared set of principles – including, crucially, self-determination for the people of Ireland subject to the consent of the people of Northern Ireland – which would come to underpin the Belfast Good Friday Agreement and provide a framework for its ratification.

Butler-Nally Meetings

This committee has been created to model meetings of the Butler/Nally Group, which was one of the key structures in the drafting of the Declaration. From Autumn 1993 onwards, Chilcot and Ó hUiginn were also part of the negotiating team working on the Joint Declaration.

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Session 17820: 1993-09-10 12:00:03

[Exact time unknown] The Butler/Nally Group met to discuss JD6. The British delegation made it clear they would not get into drafting, but suggested that the Framework document that the Intergovernmental Conference had mandated the Liaison Group to produce should be used to produce text which could then be imported into a further Irish draft of JD6. Nally and Ó hUiginn agreed to take this proposal to the Taoiseach.

Membership (at session start):

Robin Butler, John Chilcot, Dermot Nally, Seán Ó hUiginn (4 total)

Representing 2 delegations:

British Government , Irish Government

Imported Documents

  • Resolution to Mandate the Liaison Group to Create a Joint Framework Document (e990051) imports from Anglo-Irish Intergovernmental Conference: Plenary Sessions,
    on Friday, 10 September 1993, at 12:00
  • Resolution to Use the Language from the Joint Framework Document to Solve Paragraph 4 (e990054) imports from British Government,
    on Friday, 10 September 1993, at 12:00

Imported Amendments

Exported Documents

  • Resolution to Use the Language from the Joint Framework Document to Solve Paragraph 4 (e990054)
    • Imported by 'Resolution to Use the Language from the Joint Framework Document to Solve Paragraph 4' (e990070) in Irish Government,
      on Friday, 10 September 1993, at 12:00
    • Imported by 'Resolution to Use the Language from the Joint Framework Document to Solve Paragraph 4' (e990097) in Prime Minister-Taoiseach Meetings,
      on Friday, 10 September 1993, at 12:00
    • Imported by 'Resolution to Use the Language from the Joint Framework Document to Solve Paragraph 4' (e990098) in Informal British-Irish Bilaterals,
      on Friday, 10 September 1993, at 12:00

Exported Amendments

Resources (3):

Resource Collections (0):

None

Resource Items (3):

Letter from John Chilcot to Roderic Lyne Enclosing a Requested Draft of a Letter from John Major to Albert Reynolds and Recording a Butler/Nally Meeting on 10 September 1993 - (link)

John Chilcot writes to introduce a draft of a letter from John Major to Albert Reynolds, in response to a request from Roderic Lyne. Chilcot explains the context to the letter, principally a meeting between representatives of the British government on the one hand (himself and Robin Butler) and representatives of the Irish government on the other (Dermot Nally and Seán Ó hUiginn). This occurred on 10th September. They key positions elucidated were as follows: a British assertion that the current draft would not run but that the government would be constructive in reviewing what the Irish presented, the British view that the current treatment of the consent principle and the issue of self-determination was inadequate, the Irish view that the JDI was the surest route to peace - in contrast to the British privileging of the talks process. Chilcot relays John Hume's lukewarm enthusaism for the JDI and expresses his own scepticism that the Hume/Adams talks will be more constructive. David Gillmore and Robin Butler were copied into the letter and enclosure.

Meeting of the Anglo-Irish Intergovernmental Conference on 10 September 1993 - (link)

Photocopied summary note [by David Donoghue] of a meeting of the Anglo-Irish Intergovernmental Conference [held in London] on 10 September 1993. The Secretary of State proposes that the Liaison Group work on a "'joint framework statement' with a substantial constitutional component". [The British Government intended to use this to develop suitable language for a future draft of the Joint Declaration.]

Meeting of the Nally/Butler Group on 10 September 1993 - (link)

Photocopied note by Dermot Nally of his meeting with Robin Butler, on 10 September 1993. Also present at the meeting were Seán Ó hUiginn, and John Chilcot. The note is addressed to Albert Reynolds and marked “secret and personal”. Items discussed include the wording of the draft Joint Declaration; the nature of a referendum to follow the outcome of the present process; and a British Government proposal for the Liaison Group to be mandated to draw up a paper on the position of the two Governments which could be used to develop Joint Declaration language. Further includes a full report by Seán Ó hUiginn of the same meeting, dated 13 September 1993.

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