Sinn Fein
The Week in Review
20-27 March 2014
Dedicated to Tony Benn 1925-2014

Tony Benn – A friend of Ireland
On 27 March Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams TD and party colleagues Martin McGuinness MLA and Michelle Gildernew MP attended the funeral of Tony Benn in St Margaret’s Church, Westminster Abbey.
Gerry Adams paid tribute to Tony Benn who he described as “a tireless and articulate campaigner for democracy, social justice and equality in Britain”. He said he was “an internationalist, as well as a stalwart friend and advocate for peace in Ireland and for Irish unity”.
He added “Tony strenuously opposed the policy of austerity and rejected both Tory and Labour cuts to the rights and entitlements of citizens, especially welfare cuts”.
He said his “earliest recollection of meeting Tony was in London in July 1983, a month after I had been elected for the first time as the MP for West Belfast. I have met him many times since then and occasionally he travelled to Ireland to speak at events”.
“In an interview Tony explained his attitude to British policy in Ireland succinctly. He said:
“The problem is not an ‘Irish problem’ in the United Kingdom, but a British problem in Ireland. Once you get that straight you can see it quite differently.
I’m not a nationalist but I support the right of people to control their own affairs and to that extent I am really strongly in favour of getting the British out of Northern Ireland.”
Mr Adams added “Three years ago Sinn Féin organised an event in the London Irish Centre to mark the 30th anniversary of the Hunger Strike. Tony was the final speaker. He spoke of how
necessary it is to see the Irish struggle for self-determination not simply as a small isolated fight, but as part of a huge and general struggle against colonialism worldwide. He spoke with conviction that Irish reunification would happen”.
He concluded “On behalf of Sinn Féin I want to extend my condolences to Tony’s many friends but especially his children; Stephen, Hilary, Melissa, Joshua.”
Earlier, Michelle Gildernew MP paid respects to
Tony Benn on behalf of Sinn Fein MPs, attending the Chapel of St Mary Undercroft in the House of Commons, on the evening of 26 March, where he reposed overnight.
Michelle Gildernew MP said she was “proud to be representing the Sinn Féin MPs” and added “Tony was a great friend of the Irish people, a
politician of immense standing and principle, as an activist and as an MP. He was a committed socialist and internationalist, and a strong campaigner for justice and freedom – especially in relation to Ireland.”
She described Tony Benn as “a champion for humanity all his life, in Britain, Ireland and throughout the world. He will be deeply missed”.

Sinn Fein MP – ‘OTRs claims disingenuous, with no basis in fact’
Sinn Fein MP Conor Murphy commented on a British House of Commons debate on the issues around the High Court Judgement in relation to John Downey, initiated by the DUP, SDLP and other MPs.
Mr Murphy challenged assertions by the DUP, the SDLP and others that they were not aware of the scheme for dealing with the ‘On the Runs’ (OTR) issue as `disingenuous with no basis in fact’.
Mr Murphy said: “The grandstanding by the DUP and other unionist politicians, repeated today, have more to do with upcoming elections than in dealing with and resolving the serious legacy issues which we attempted to address during the Haass negotiations. Indeed, the deliberate misrepresentation about the facts of the OTR issue simply serve to divert attention away from the fact that unionist political leaders have blocked progress in terms of moving forward and implementing the Haass proposals.”
He added: “One of the legacy issues is the issue of OTRs. The British and Irish governments at Weston Park made a commitment to resolve this issue”.
He added, and I quote: “Both Governments recognise that there is an issue to be addressed, with the completion of the early release scheme, about supporters of organisations now on cease-fire against whom there are outstanding prosecutions, and in some cases extradition proceedings, for offences committed before 10 April 1998. Such people would, if convicted, stand to benefit from the early release scheme. The Governments accept that it would be a natural development of the scheme for such prosecutions not to be pursued and will as soon as possible, and in any event before the end of the year, take such steps as are necessary in their jurisdictions to resolve this difficulty so that those concerned are no longer pursued.”
Mr Murphy added, “Yet seasoned politicians from all other Parties in the North are pretending not to be aware of this. The scheme being used is not an amnesty and it is not some “get out of jail free card”. It was simply clarification of an individual’s status as to whether there were any outstanding warrants on them.”
He said “It seems that there are some who have been for years beating a law and order drum who now have difficulty accepting the word of the British Attorney General about the legality of this scheme. Dominic Grieve has said that the process to resolve some of the OTR cases, was a lawful process.”
He said it was “particularly disappointing that the SDLP should be to the fore in sponsoring this motion in Westminster which can only give comfort to anti-agreement unionists and so-called dissident republicans”.
He concluded: “Let everyone step up to the plate and start grappling with real issues affecting the lives of those we represent and stop manufacturing excuses for not progressing. The existence of On the Runs is one of the many consequences of our failed past. We have collectively agreed that we need to find an acceptable way to deal with this past if we are serious about this then, there is no alternative but to return to the Haass blueprint and build on its progress.”

* Conor Murphy will be in London to meet MPs next week on 2nd April in Westminster.

International Day for the Right to the Truth is a opportunity to return to the Haass
Sinn Féin MLA Jennifer McCann, speaking on 23 March, has said that International Day for the Right to the Truth is a opportunity to return to the Haass proposals.
Ms McCann said it was “important if we are to move away from the past and create a better future that we deal with legacy issues including the truth surrounding the recent conflict”.
She said Sinn Féin had proposed that there be “an international, independent truth recovery process as the best way forward”, adding “it’s our view there cannot be a process operated by any of the protagonists in the recent conflict”.
She said “Others have different ideas and that is fair enough. However, we need to take this opportunity to move the process forward in a way, which looks after the victims but also builds the future for the survivors”.
She said that while the recent Haass proposals were a compromise for Republicans “we also saw that it provided a platform, which would allow us to begin a truth recovery process”, and added “The sense of pain shared by all victims regardless of the circumstance of loss cannot be allowed to drift along onto future generations and we must act now”.
She said there was “need to support the physical, emotional and psychological needs of victims and survivors and this includes support in the quest for truth” and that the International Day for the Right to the Truth served as “a reminder that these issues have yet to be resolved and that they will not go away without being addressed”.
She urged all political parties and both the Irish and British Governments “to return to the Haass Proposals and begin their implementation immediately.”

PSNI – `retiring and rehiring scandal must never happen again’
Sinn Féin MLA Gerry Kelly said that the PSNI must ensure that the `retiring and rehiring scandal must never happen again’.
The North Belfast MLA and member of the Policing Board was commenting after a Public Accounts Committee (PAC) report said the system was not value for money.
Gerry Kelly said Sinn Féin had “pursued the question of a revolving-door policy from our previous mandate and the full facts around the extent of retiring and rehiring ex RUC personnel were kept hidden by the ‘old guard’ within the PSNI for years”.
He said that more than 1,000 people who had received substantial severance packages under Patten were rehired, “some of them were headhunted for posts that did not require policing experience”.
He added “This basically resulted in a revolving door scenario and kept other people out of jobs. There was no open competition for the posts. Those who were re-employed became unaccountable overnight as they were not accountable to the Police Ombudsman or the PSNI’s Code of Ethics, having been rehired in a civilian staff capacity. This undermined Patten and is a story of cronyism and jobs for the boys. Sinn Féin raised these questions from 2009 but some of those at the top of the PSNI resisted revealing the facts.”
He concluded: “This method of retiring/rehiring did substantial damage to confidence in policing and must not happen again.”

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