Irish Examiner view: Ruling sheds light on PSNI concerns

The Investigatory Powers Tribunal ruled yesterday that a covert surveillance operation authorised by a senior PSNI police offer, intended to try to identify a source giving information to two journalists, was unlawful. Picture: Niall Carson/PA

Developments in the North over the last 24 hours or so should give pause to all on this island.

The Investigatory Powers Tribunal ruled yesterday that a covert surveillance operation authorised by a senior PSNI police offer, intended to try to identify a source giving information to two journalists, was unlawful. The case relates to a television documentary made by Barry McCaffrey and Trevor Birney about the 1994 loyalist paramilitary massacre in Loughinisland, Co Down, and a specific confidential document which appeared in the documentary.

Former PSNI chief constable George Hamilton approved a directed surveillance authorisation aimed at finding out who had leaked the confidential document to the journalists, but yesterday the tribunal quashed the authorisation. Since then, both Mr Birney and Mr McCaffrey have called for a public inquiry into police surveillance of journalists.

That was not the only significant development in the area of justice yesterday in the North. Mr Justice Michael Humphreys told the High Court in Belfast that the British government would have to hold a public inquiry into the murder of Sean Brown in May 1997, as “the United Kingdom has manifestly failed to investigate the murder”.

Mr Brown was abducted from Bellaghy GAA club in Derry, where he was chairman, and killed.

No one has ever been convicted of his murder, but an inquest earlier this year heard that state agents were among those linked to the killing.

Two years ago, the PSNI issued a public apology to Mr Brown’s widow for deficiencies in the original probe as part of a settlement in a separate civil action.

These two events took place on the same day but they relate to events going back over 30 years. The common thread appears at first to be questionable judgement, at best, on the part of the police in the North.

The fact that that police force was backed by a state operating without due regard for the principles of natural justice, however, is far more concerning.

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Uisce Éireann fined €3,500

Uisce Éireann was convicted yesterday of a pollution charge relating to a chemical spill last June in the River Allow in north Cork.

The case was brought by Inland Fisheries Ireland (IFI), which outlined the extent of the damage done by the spillage emanating from the Freemount water treatment plant. IFI’s representative told the court that “conservatively” 10,000 fish had been killed in the spill, but the number was likely to be in the tens of thousands as the pollution killed fish up to 8 km downriver from the source, extending through some 40,000 square metres of river.

The spill had done “quite significant and irreparable damage”, according to Judge Colm Roberts, who added: “I have to convict, it’s too serious not to.”

He fined Uisce Éireann €3,500, with one month to pay.

This appalling environmental disaster was bad enough, but as ever the devil is in the detail. The court heard that Uisce Éireann had taken over very old infrastructure in the case of the Freemount plant, and the structural issues which had led to the spillage had since been addressed. However, the judge rightly pointed out that those issues had not been picked up in the facilities audit carried out when Uisce Éireann had initially taken over the plant.

This seems a serious oversight on the part of the water utility’s technical team. It is a truism in practically every field that prevention is better than cure, and if these flaws had been identified when the plant was audited would preventative work have been cheaper than repairing the plant? The court heard that €100,000 had been spent on equipment to address issues at the plant, while cleaning up the spill had cost €65,000: a significant outlay.

It should also be pointed out that Uisce Éireann has had 18 similar convictions since 2015, though none until now for the Freemount plant. A water utility averaging two convictions a year for these kinds of offences needs to improve its performance significantly.

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Unfit for purpose

The recent killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in New York sparked a good deal of discussion of health insurers in America, and very little of it shows that industry in a positive light. For instance, there are recurring complaints that American health insurance companies follow a pattern of delaying and denying claims its customers make.

It is difficult to avoid a similar conclusion when it comes to the mother and baby home redress scheme here in Ireland, particularly after reading Irish Examiner assistant news editor Susan O’Shea’s sobering account of her family’s experience with this scheme.

The mother and baby homes are still a shameful reminder of the way Irish society abdicated responsibility for vulnerable people in this country. Any reasonable person would welcome an efficient and humane redress scheme which made some effort, however belated and inadequate, to make amends.

Yet the scheme seems “overly bureaucratic, incompetent, and almost heartless in how it treats applicants”, as Susan wrote. On the evidence provided, it was no surprise to read that Patricia Carey, the special advocate for mother and baby home, state that many survivors simply give up on the scheme: Dealing with the involved, cumbersome, and unfeeling system simply becomes too stressful for them.

This scheme appears designed not just to delay or deny but also to discourage and dissuade. Its administrators should hang their heads in shame.

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