RUC/PSNI 🪶 Same Old Story

Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭ Policing in the Occupied Six-Counties was supposed to change for the better when the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) was signed.

To a certain extent some superficial changes in the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) did come about. For example, the name of the organisation was changed to the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), and recruitment of Catholics into the renamed force increased. Other changes included ‘community representation, training, and the approach to policing’, though the latter has been brought into question on more than one occasion. The recruitment of more Roman Catholics into the force is an attempt to build trust, hitherto not present in the communities since the formation of its predecessor on 1st June 1922, and efforts have been made, so we are told, to achieve a ‘more representative workforce’ within the PSNI across the ‘divided communities’.

The former RUC was largely dominated by Protestants, and the aim of the PSNI is a 50:50 ratio of Catholic and Protestant police officers. Some of these aims and objectives have been achieved in areas such as ‘combating victimisation’ but much more needs to be done in areas like ‘building public confidence’ and ‘resourcing neighbourhood policing’. The PSNI would claim to have made significant inroads into combating organised crime pointing to ‘reductions in the harm caused by organised crime through proactive policing activity’. There is still much work to do for the PSNI before it can become an accepted police service for everybody but, as the saying goes, ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day’. Neither did it take an eternity to build!

This version the PSNI put out about combating organised crime is questionable under certain circumstances. Would the threat made by loyalists and their para-militaries to ignite a bonfire near a dump of cancer-causing asbestos and within the proximity of a hospital constitute a threat to public health? Yes, it would and therefore must, not in the usual way organised crime is perceived granted, nevertheless amount to ‘organised crime?’ Another bonfire was lit by loyalists in County Tyrone with an effigy of people in a boat and a sign saying; “stop the boats” in reference to people fleeing foreign lands where remaining would put them in great danger. The PSNI says this effigy does not “constitute a hate crime as no crime has been committed” it is, therefore, being treat as a “race incident”. The bonfire near the asbestos dump was ignited by loyalists just after mid-night on the 11th July despite warnings from the Minister of the Environment for the Six-Counties in Stormont, Andrew Muir, advising people not to attend.

Firstly, an asbestos dump should not have been there or anywhere else in the first place because it poses a threat to public health. It was/is an environmental health matter which in any part of the so-called ‘United Kingdom’ would not have been there and this bonfire, irrespective of cultural demands, constitutes a ‘serious crime’ by those who chose to ignore this threat? The asbestos was covered with an inadequate plastic type cover but if a spark hit that covering it would be of little protection against tiny particles of asbestos being released into the atmosphere putting those in attendance under immediate threat of possible asbestosis. If they really had to light the fire then priority one should have been removing the asbestos. The reality is, given the bonfire was in the close proximity of a power station which provides power to the equally close by Belfast City Hospital then, leaving aside the threat to public health from asbestos, the construction should have been taken down.

On the 10th July Belfast City Council decided given the dangers of this particular bonfire that it should be dismantled. They requested the PSNI/RUC give assistance should the contractors who would be taking down the structure come under attack from loyalists. This request, after “careful consideration”, was refused by the police. They totally ignored the risk level which, having once worked in environmental health, I know was very real to public health. The other bonfire bearing the effigies of migrants in a boat erected in Moygashel, Co. Tyrone, was condemned by Amnesty International. The effigy was clearly racist in its intent and to me, and countless other people, constituted a hate crime. The PSNI obviously did not see it this way, calling it a hate “incident”, stating “no crime had been committed.”

Such an outpouring of hate should tell us a lot about the people who erected the bonfire. The effigy was accompanied by an Irish Tricolour flag showing these people who claim they want peace under the GFA want nothing of the sort. The refusal by the PSNI to intervene even on public health grounds in the case of the South Belfast bonfire show the nature of the force has not changed in any great significance since the ending of the sectarian RUC days. What may have been the response of the PSNI to a bonfire of similar size in a nationalist/republican area? If a fire was to be ignited close to the Royal Victoria Hospital on the republican Falls Road, what would this supposedly reformed police force do or say?

Nobody is trying to take away the culture enjoyed by those who wish to commemorate the victory of King William III in 1691 in the Williamite Wars, part of the ‘Wars of the Three Kingdoms,’ over James II. That said, surely public safety must take preference over this ‘cultural’ event as the loyalists see it? Even some lodges of the Orange Order voiced concern over this particular bonfire and the racist effigy on the bonfire in Tyrone. What happens if the bonfire in South Belfast had got out of control and released countless particles of asbestos into the environment to say nothing of the danger posed to Belfast City Hospital?

The PSNI/RUC emerged in their true colours showing that very little has changed since those bygone days of sectarian hatred in the RUC. Their refusal to intervene and protect contractors tasked with taking down a health hazard and racially motivated hate crime in the two bonfires under discussion in case the loyalists got a bit upset showed their true position. Fortunately the bonfire in Meridi Street, South Belfast, went off without incident. This was probably more by luck than judgement and does not negate the fact that a major threat to public health existed. The allowing of this huge construction to be ignited must still be described as an act of extreme folly by Belfast City Council and questions must be asked, one being what powers do this elected assembly of local authority politicians hold? The decision by the PSNI/RUC not to protect contractors must at least be questioned and at worst whoever took the decision not to intervene should have disciplinary action taken against them by their PSNI superiors!

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.