Rabbitte line on garda brutality is quite rich

ON Saturday, January 10, Labour party leader Pat Rabbitte called on Justice Minister Michael McDowell to “stop delaying” the appointment of a Garda ombudsman — a statement which I tend to agree with despite the fact that I am neither a Labour supporter nor a fan of Pat Rabbitte’s.

I find the Labour leader's comments quite rich, though, given the fact that it was under a Fine Gael/Labour coalition that the infamous Garda 'heavy gang' tortured suspects during interrogations in order to force confessions. Was this the way the Fine Gael-Labour coalition sought to improve accountability and transparency in the police force in the 1980s?

Again that coalition's justice minister, Michael Noonan, vehemently defended the Garda unit's credibility and, in the early 1990s, he arrogantly resisted the growing calls for the release and pardon of Nicky Kelly in relation to the Sallins mail train robbery.

He stated at the time that to release Nicky Kelly, despite the new evidence, would have been to imply that the judges acted "incorrectly or incompetently."

This was a man who claimed to have been brutalised at the hands of the Garda heavy gang while detained in the Bridewell.

The irony of this scenario is that ten years later, Mr Kelly is now a county councillor for one of the parties which sought to keep him behind bars.

Another example of FG/Labour's way of promoting confidence in the forces of law and order?

The most damning aspect of the recent Barron report was the role played by the FG/Labour coalition of the day a government of such upstanding defenders of law and order as Liam Cosgrave, Paddy Cooney and Conor Cruise O'Brien.

They made no attempt to follow up leads or to assist the investigation in any way.

Indeed, serving members of the gardaí at the time were under the impression that the Cosgrave government did not want the investigation to continue. And it didn't. There's transparency and accountability for you, Mr Rabbitte.

Taking all of this into account, it is my belief that the Labour leader is attempting to deflect criticism from himself and his party over the Barron report by making such a big hullabaloo over the recent allegations of Garda torture and misconduct acts which his party have defended in the past.

Eamonn Long,

99, Glebemount,

Wicklow.