Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

The shooting of Mark Haddock on 30 May was a shocking and appalling incident. I understand that two men have been charged with the attempted murder of Mr. Haddock and remanded in custody at Belfast Magistrate's Court until 4 July. The PSNI is investigating this matter fully and, as such, it would be inappropriate of me to comment further.

I am aware of all the issues concerning the involvement of Mark Haddock in incidents referred to by Deputy Ó Caoláin, but I obviously do not have proof of these issues. Some weeks ago, we discussed in the House the matter in respect of the case of Raymond McCord. Mr. Haddock has been widely talked about for some years as someone involved in leading a gang, including the gang that attempted to bomb the Deputy's office, and a lot of other cases where people were killed.

That has been the position. It all forms part of an enormous investigation by the Police Ombudsman, Mrs. Nuala O'Loan, into the police's handling of an inquiry into the murder of Raymond McCord Jnr by the UVF. The inquiry also covers claims of collusion between the former RUC Special Branch and the loyalist groups and loyalist paramilitaries. The Deputy's point is that all this leads to an enormous amount of collusion. We have raised this matter time and again.

Lest I forget, Mrs. O'Loan's son was viciously assaulted yesterday morning. He got a ferocious beating in an appalling incident. I put on record my unequivocal condemnation of it. Our thoughts are with Mrs. O'Loan and her family at this time. The PSNI is investigating that matter and it would be inappropriate of me to comment further. Her son had several bones broken and received severe injuries. She does her utmost to do a good job in all these cases. I do not want to jump to conclusions on who was involved. From what I have heard, it might be the wrong assumption to make. I record my sympathy with the O'Loan family and will not comment on who was involved, other than that it is a barbaric group, whichever side it purports to represent.

We have raised the issue of collusion, particularly in respect of a number of incidents, such as the Finucane case. We pursued it and continue to pursue it. There is no need for a special summit because we use every opportunity to raise it and we will continue to do so. As Deputy Ó Caoláin knows better than I, evidence of the level of collusion and of the involvement of informers and insiders appears to grow all the time. In the interests of progress it is necessary for such activities to stop because it is more difficult to bring sanity to the situation the longer they persist. We cannot investigate every single event in the past because we would never make progress if we did. However, we will continue to focus on the Pat Finucane inquiry and other areas of collusion on which we have focused in the past year or two.

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