The legal definition of “vexatious” is “an action, or the bringer of an action, that is brought without sufficient grounds for winning, purely to cause annoyance to the defendant” – it’s a buzzing fly in the ear, a stubbed toe on a door-frame.

This became a brief, but defining and particularly galling sticking point in the Queen’s speech last week, as she announced the plans of the Boris Johnson-led government. Among the bloated Brexit rhetoric and promises for boosting the NHS, a sinister yet familiar pledge lurked. The government, the Queen said, “will bring forward proposals to tackle vexatious claims that undermine our armed forces and will continue to seek better ways of dealing with legacy issues that provide better outcomes for victims and survivors”.

In about 15 seconds, and with one jarring adjective, the British government rejects 50 devastating years of struggle, arrogantly disregarding the pursuit of justice by the surviving families of victims of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. This statement was a direct reference to the past and ongoing investigations into extrajudicial killings in Northern Ireland; Johnson and his government have long made clear their plans to enshrine into law protections for the British soldiers brought before the courts to answer for the Bloody Sunday and Ballymurphy massacres.

The political efforts to halt investigations into soldiers’ crimes in Northern Ireland and other conflict societies only grows, its language beyond the vexing. It has moved somewhat seamlessly from David Cameron as prime minister apologising for the “unjustified and unjustifiable” killings of 14 civilians by armed forces on Bloody Sunday, to Theresa May attacking “activist leftwing human-rights lawyers” who “harangue and harass” soldiers. Then came the disastrous former Northern Ireland secretary Karen Bradley who called their actions “dignified”, and former defence secretary Gavin Williamson offering to fund legal costs for soldiers who, he says, “served with courage and distinction to bring peace”.

The Queen’s speech, in its inhumanity, added another barrier to attempts to hold the state and its agents accountable for monstrous actions. It serves to show that Irish lives and the suffering that has rumbled through generations are a cumbersome burden to be avoided.

A trip through very recent Northern Irish history – one that I’d urge many people to take – and the crimes of the Parachute Regiment sent by the British government is at times beyond words that could capture the period’s true horrors. In August 1971, 10 civilians were gunned down by British paratroopers in Ballymurphy. The prolonged inquest into armed forces allegedly covering up the horrifying truth had its last court session just this month, with distressing details relayed.

Bloody Sunday in January 1972 saw peaceful civil rights protesters and innocent bystanders killed in appalling ways – unarmed teenager John Duddy shot as he fled the Bogside scene, Bernard McGuigan shot in the back of the head while aiding another person and waving a white handkerchief, Jim Wray shot as he lay mortally wounded. The Saville inquiry, set up by Tony Blair’s Labour government in 1998, found no warnings were given before shooting, the killings were largely unjustified, and that the soldiers repeatedly lied to cover their crimes. Soldier F, who faces multiple murder and attempted murder charges, is currently on trial and is the only ex-paratrooper to be charged in relation to that day.

The funeral of one of the 13 people killed by British soldiers in Derry on Bloody Sunday. Photograph: AP

The continued pushback by the state and its protection of the perpetrators – from the whitewashed first inquiry quickly produced after Bloody Sunday, to the words of veterans’ secretary Johnny Mercer and Johnson declarations – has culminated in decades of pain for the victims’ families, and an obstacle-ridden but vital pursuit of the truth on state-sanctioned killings. Despite state resistance, those called “vexatious” have fought for clarity and justice with dignified determination.

The European Convention on Human Rights has helped underpin solid investigations into state collusion – but it is one of the many things the Conservative government now seeks to defy, while the loss of the Police Service of Northern Ireland’s historical enquiries team in 2014, due to budget cuts, has impeded subsequent attempts to get to the truth of the Troubles. These protections and facilities help citizens – much like the imperilled Good Friday Agreement and the Human Rights Act – but present a threat to a state that sanctions atrocities. Johnson’s actions further erode any hope of future accountability.

The prime minister cannot “draw a line”, as he claims, under a conflict that we in Northern Ireland continue to reckon with: a country still treated with contempt, its people used as political pawns by Westminster. We see this in the impact of intergenerational trauma on a post-conflict society, one decimated by cuts unleashed by a party that does not even put forward parliamentary candidates in Northern Ireland.

The impact of the Troubles and government indifference to its aftermath is in substance abuse, alcohol problems and an urgent mental health crisis. It is one-in-six people languishing on waiting lists for their first hospital appointment, and a suicide level that surpasses the Troubles’ death toll. It is a prime minister that suggests hare-brained schemes to build a bridge between Northern Ireland and Scotland, while rural communities struggle with poor transport infrastructure. It’s the death of the journalist Lyra McKee and renewed paramilitary action.

How does the government’s compassion for the armed forces square with the lack of empathy shown to those living through past and present crises in Northern Ireland?

We are witnessing craven attempts to provide continued amnesty for state-sponsored criminals, and bald-faced appeals to stoke jingoism, all at the expense of the bereaved, but still unbeaten. Human rights cannot be enshrined for a select few. As Brexit looms and Stormont attempts to drag itself out of a self-inflicted torpor, we must resist the Conservative government’s dehumanisation of Northern Irish people once again.

• Anna Cafolla is a Belfast-born journalist