North Ireland’s Compensation Agency has said that reports on the amount of money which families of the Omagh bomb victims are to receive are misleading.
Relatives of the victims had strongly criticised the payment of £7,500, which has been paid out to each family, as being totally inadequate. However, the Chief Executive of the Compensation Agency in Belfast said that the figure was not a final payment, but rather the first of three stages of compensation.
Dennis Stanley said that the second stage of payment is the reimbursement of funeral costs, followed by the calculation of pecuniary loss. He said that this is assessed on the potential earnings of those killed and designed to compensate for the loss of income of the next-of-kin. He pointed out that pecuniary loss takes time to calculate and said that, in the case of the Omagh bombing, this stage has not yet been reached.
He added that no amount of money can compensate for the loss of a human life. “This legislation does not seek to place a value on a life,” he said. “It can only make payments as a gesture to the bereaved family. But, misleading reports like those this morning help no-one".
Some of the relatives of the Omagh bomb victims were outraged when they received the compensation cheques for just seven thousand five hundred pounds. Omagh DUP Assembly member Oliver Gibson, who lost a relative in the explosion, branded the Northern Ireland Office a scrooge after hearing the amount of compensation being offered.
The issue is due to be discussed on Tuesday when members of the recently formed Omagh Self Help and Support Group have been invited to meet the Northern Ireland Minister John McFall.
