Accountable, representative, unbiased policing

Date: 22nd Feb '02

Name: article from RM Irish news round up

Analysis: Accountable, representative, unbiased policing

By Gerry Kelly, MLA Sinn Fein Spokesperson on Policing

In a an interview on Sunday on the BBC Breakfast With Frost
programme An Taoiseach Bertie Ahern once again has urged Sinn
Fein to take its seats on the Policing Board. Notwithstanding the
fact that our position is clear on the British government's
failure to implement the Good Friday Agreement's principles of
policing or the Patten recommendations, I wish to re-state the
reasons why we will not do so.

THRESHOLD FOR A NEW BEGINNING

Sinn Fein, in accordance with the Good Friday Agreement, seeks a
police service which is representative of the community, fully
accountable to that community, free from partisan political
control and which respects and upholds human rights. We believe
that, if the Patten proposals in their entirety had been
implemented the threshold might have been created to make a new
beginning possible and for republicans to seriously consider
participation in and support for the policing structures. Patten
has not been implemented in full. No one is claiming otherwise.

NO PLAN TO BE REPRESENTATIVE

Instead the situation is that, despite its new name the 6 county
police force remains unrepresentative. It will be a cold house
for catholics and an icehouse for any nationalist foolish enough
to seek entry. Catholics will remain a tiny minority within this
police force for many years to come and nationalists and
republicans are not represented at all. For instance, the British
government refused to make public indicative annual goals and
timetables as a means to this end. They say they accept but have
refused to implement the Patten recommendation to disband the
Full Time RUC Reserve. The police force is not and will not be
representative of the community it polices because among other
things there is no plan or effective mechanisms to achieve this.

PARTISAN POLITICAL CONTROL

Crucially this police force is not accountable to the community
and on critical issues is outside the control of the Policing
Board. This much has been implicitly acknowledged by the SDLP
recently meeting with the British Security Minister to 'express
their exasperation' at the lack of action being taken to curb the
loyalist killing campaign. Why did the SDLP have to do this when
they sit on the Policing Board? Why is this necessary when we
were told that the Board could summon the Chief Constable to
discuss anything to do with policing? Quite simply because the
power is still retained by the British Government over these
matters and not subject to the democratic accountability of a
Policing Board as envisaged by Patten. The reality is that the
Policing Board does not have the powers required to ensure that
the police force is democratically accountable; does not have the
powers to investigate their abysmal response to the intensive and
concerted UDA pogrom of the past 10 months and to get to the
bottom of the reasons for this. Accountability has been carefully
written out of the policing equation. Partisan political control
continues to be exerted by the securocrats in the NIO and the
former RUC Chief Constable Ronnie Flanagan. The baleful influence
of the Special Branch and their relationship with the UDA remains
intact. What we have is a repackaged RUC.

HUMAN RIGHTS

Nor can we be confident about the renamed police force respecting
human rights. For instance, a number of weeks ago in this
newspaper, Maurice Hayes, a member of the Patten Commission,
expressed disappointment and perplexity regarding the failure to
require all officers in the police force to swear the new human
rights oath. Similarly he could not understand why the Patten
proposals on the Special Branch have not been implemented. He
confesses that the mishandling of Patten has resulted in
nationalists and republicans losing confidence in the new
policing arrangements.

Other Patten Commissioners - Clifford Shearing and Gerard Lynch -
have been equally scathing of the British government. Shearing
stated categorically that the Patten Report had been "gutted".

THE UNTOUCHABLES: SPECIAL BRANCH - BUSINESS AS USUAL

The issue of the Special Branch, the force within a force, goes
to the heart of the Policing issue. Whether in relation to the
Omagh Bomb inquiry, the murder of Pat Finucane, or scores of
other disputed killings, the activities and procedures of the
Special Branch remain at the heart of nationalist mistrust. These
are the people who have hindered investigations and inquiries
into the deaths of over 400 people killed in disputed killings by
British forces and the 100's of people killed through collusion
between the British forces, the Special Branch and the loyalist
death squads. Of all of these cases the Pat Finucane killing is
the one which so dramatically and tragically exposes the real
role of the Special Branch. The leader of the UDA group which
carried out the killing was Tommy Lyttle, a Special Branch Agent.
The man who provided the weapon, William Stobie was a Special
Branch Agent. The man who confessed on tape to RUC CID officers
to carrying out the shooting, Ken Barrett, was a Special Branch
Agent and the man who set up the killing, Brian Nelson, was a
British Army Agent. The Special Branch officers who planned,
ordered and facilitated the execution of Pat Finucane are still
there. Their agents in the UDA in North Belfast are still in
business. They continue to have the same power as they did in
1989 when they ordered this killing and they still are exempt
from any form of democratic accountability and there is no
mechanism to deal with the threat posed by the Special Branch, a
fact demonstrated by the killing of William Stobie before
Christmas.

These are the people who developed the RUC into a force whose
prime motivation was the maintenance of the northern statelet as
a cold house for catholics in general and republicans in
particular. They are still there. They do not have to take the
new oath which specifically requires them to respect the human
rights of all. The Policing Board can ask Ronnie Flanagan for a
report on the activities of the Special Branch and Special Branch
agents like the late William Stobie, if they believe there has
been wrongdoing. Ronnie Flanagan, under the British Government's
'Police Act', can refuse outright because it is a 'sensitive
personal' matter.

These are some of the more serious concerns which prompted Sinn
Fein to take up the positions we have in respect of the issue of
a new beginning to policing.

NATIONAL AND DEMOCRATIC CONSENSUS

Sinn Fein is committed to seeking a genuinely new policing
service based on partnership, representativeness, accountability
and human rights. Partisan political control is not acceptable.
As we all know it means a police state. The people we represent
want policing and need policing for community safety. The tragedy
is that the opportunity presented by the GFA and the Patten
Report to transform the policing environment has not been taken.
And this is the message Sinn F"in is getting from nationalists
and republicans about the current policing structures. Most
nationalists and all republicans believe that the Irish
Government and the SDLP made a significant mistake when they
backed the present policing structures, that the SDLP has allowed
the British government off the hook on this issue. It is our firm
conviction that the Irish News editorials on this issue do not
reflect accurately popular opinion. Moreover, now that the
nationalist consensus on this issue has been breached, it will be
that much harder to get the necessary movement from the British
government and the NIO securocrats.

But this cannot simply be about 'we told you so'. There must be
movement. Sinn Fein is not interested in scoring political points
against the SDLP or the Irish government on this matter. Policing
is too important an issue for that. Nationalists and republicans
want us to get it right, and we remain willing and prepared to
work with all of those who genuinely want to see a new beginning
to Policing. Sinn Fein will not settle for second best. We will
not settle for repackaged structures, controls, procedures and
attitudes that have failed us all for generations.

c. RM Distribution and others. Articles may be reprinted with credit.

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