Shifty Boris shoves our old soldiers back into the firing line...

LET’S see if Al Johnson can get out of this one. The Tories have said many times that they will put a stop to the pursuit of longretired British soldiers through the courts, for crimes allegedly committed during the Northern Irish Troubles. But they have also just agreed to do exactly the opposite. A key part of the resurrection of ‘power-sharing’ in Northern Ireland is a pledge to revive a rather nasty deal called the Stormont House Agreement, swallowed by the Cameron government just before Christmas 2014.

This pretty much makes sure there will be more of these politically motivated cases.

It is the latest stage in the appeasement of the Provisional IRA and of the other Ulster terror groups, which began in 1998 with the lawless mass release of scores of grisly terrorists, ‘loyalist’ as well as Republican.

This surrender to criminal violence, the most shameful and abject in modern British history, is generally ignored or forgotten on the mainland. Its dire effects are mostly felt in Northern Ireland itself. But there is one part of it which reaches across the Irish Sea, and that is the unceasing attempt to pursue these cold cases.

Every time it happens, the Tories say they will stop it. And then it happens again. This is because it is what the IRA (and its front organisation Sinn Fein) want. And what they want happens. Guess why.

Maybe some of these cases are just. I cannot tell. It is not the point. Justice has never been the point of the 1998 agreement. This not only led to the rapid freedom of many serious murderers, it also effectively prevented the prosecution or punishment of alleged terrorist criminals who were not tried before the deal was reached.

You may remember the case of John Downey, the alleged culprit of the bloody 1982 Hyde Park bombing. He was one of nearly 200 people who had been given written official promises that they would not be prosecuted. And, as the judge said, even if he had been convicted he would have served no more than two years – for a crime of astonishing savagery.

So that is the deal for the terrorist side, who are supposed to have been defeated in 1998. But the Stormont House Agreement, which Mr Johnson has just agreed to put into effect, promises: ‘Legislation will establish a new independent body to take forward investigations into outstanding Troubles-related deaths; the Historical Investigations Unit (HIU).’ It adds: ‘In respect of its criminal investigations, the HIU will have full policing powers.’

The observant Sarah Jones, Labour MP for Croydon Central, quizzed the Prime Minister about this on Wednesday. She asked: ‘The press were briefed last year that the Prime Minister was going to bring an end to all ongoing investigations from the conflict, and he said on Monday that he would not support vexatious claims when there was no new evidence. However, the Stormont agreement includes the HIU, and the point of all the ongoing investigations is that the original evidence has never been properly investigated, so will the Prime Minister tell us today, yes or no, whether he now supports the investigation of every single outstanding claim?’

Mr Johnson’s answer was pure waffle, full of holes: ‘Nothing in the agreement will stop us going ahead with legislation to ensure that no one who has served in our armed forces suffers vexatious or unfair prosecution for cases that happened many years ago when no new evidence has been provided. We will legislate to ensure that cannot happen.’

Who decides what is vexatious or unfair? What if the HIU insists that the evidence is new and the Belfast prosecution service agrees?

Heaven help poor British soldiers if this is all the protection they have. The shadow of the gunman still lies across this land.