SDLP accuses SF of exaggerating

Sinn Féin demands for a devolved Northern government to run policing and justice are decorative, an SDLP rival claimed today.

As Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and British prime minister Tony Blair prepared to focus during the second day of the talks in Scotland on getting Sinn Féin to endorse the PSNI, SDLP negotiator Sean Farren claimed real change had already been delivered on policing for five years.

“I think there has been a lot of over-exaggeration and over-statement from Sinn Féin about the transfer of policing and justice powers to Stormont," the North Antrim Assembly member said before the second day of talks in St Andrews.

“They talk about accountability but we have actually been involved in policing for five years and have witnessed significant changes at first hand.

“While the transfer of powers would be symbolic, it remains to be seen how a minister would perform any more effectively in that regard.”

Mr Ahern and Mr Blair have identified two key issues that could open the door to a return to power-sharing in the North for the first time in four years.

They want Sinn Féin to join the three other parties that would form a devolved executive – Ian Paisley’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), the Ulster Unionists and the SDLP – in endorsing the PSNI.

They also want a clear signal, particularly from the DUP, that power-sharing will take place.

The North’s politicians must agree a way forward on these issues by November 24.

After the first day of talks in the luxury £58m (€85.9m) Fairmont Hotel and golf resort, the DUP and Sinn Féin remained divided over which move should come first.

On his arrival at the talks, Mr Paisley, who could be the North’s first minister if a power-sharing government is formed, insisted republicans needed to deliver not just on policing but also on ending criminality and handing over the proceeds of IRA crime.

“If you are going to be in government of a country you must support the police,” the North Antrim MP said.

“You have to support the police not by joining a police board but by giving the police the information you have and also give them evidence to help them to solve the crimes that terrorism has committed.

“Also, you have to hand back your ill-gotten gains. We want to see that and if we see that then there is hope.”

Later, Martin McGuinness, who could serve alongside Mr Paisley as deputy first minister, insisted his party could not endorse the PSNI without the DUP first agreeing to a revival of power-sharing.

The Mid Ulster MP said: “Ian Paisley cannot walk into these negotiations and say we need the issue of policing resolved and it is over to Sinn Féin.

“It is their responsibility to deal with it too.

“We cannot deal with the issue on our own. What I am saying is we need help, Ian Paisley’s help.

"We need the British prime minister’s help in facing up to the issues which are causing difficulties for us within the process of resolving the issue of policing.”

Mr McGuinness said that as things stood it would be a waste of time for him to ask republicans in Crossmaglen, south Derry or east Tyrone to join the PSNI, which he viewed as a British-controlled police service.

“What we can do in the context of getting powers transferred from British control to a locally-elected administration is make a very convincing case that this is a policing service that is rooted on the island of Ireland and which is working in co-operation with the gardaí to root out criminality, which is the enemy of all of us,” he said.