Michael McDowell (Dublin South East, Progressive Democrats)

I am pleased to have an opportunity to discuss this issue, given its importance to the administration of justice in this jurisdiction, the political situation in Northern Ireland and, not least, the family of the late Detective Garda Jerry McCabe and Detective Garda Ben O'Sullivan, whose courage and dignity I salute.

I regret the tone of the remarks that have been made here this evening. There have been charges of hypocrisy and electioneering and hints of duplicity. In the circumstances, it is sad because it contrasts with the dignity and reserve of those who are closest to this issue. I refer to the remarks made by Detective Garda McCabe's family and Detective Garda O'Sullivan. I am saddened by the tone of remarks which have been made in an attempt to score political points and by references to electoral prospects in the mid-west, which are not related to the core issue before the House, which is a far deeper issue.

I reiterate my view that those who killed Detective Garda Jerry McCabe by shooting him twice, and who pumped nine bullets into the slightly luckier Detective Garda Ben O'Sullivan, are examples of all that is worst, lowest and most cowardly in Irish society. Such people are least deserving of any admiration, support or sympathy. I agree with Senators who said that these people's conviction for manslaughter did not reflect in any way the gravity of the offences they committed. Their sentences reflected the gravity of another offence committed by those closely allied with them, namely the intimidation of witnesses to prevent the full facts from being expounded on the basis of admissible evidence before the Special Criminal Court. The court and the DPP conducted themselves in the face of such intimidation. The sentences which were imposed were quite long for a manslaughter conviction, but they were light when one considers the gravity of what happened in Adare in June 1996.

I say without equivocation and without speaking from both sides of my mouth that it is the fixed view of the Government that the killers of Detective Garda Jerry McCabe should serve their entire sentences. There is no question of their early release under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement. Suggestions that have been made publicly that there was such an agreement, or that there was a private agreement between the Taoiseach and Mr. Gerry Adams that would happen at a time when they had not even been convicted of any crime are wholly untrue and unreliable. I am saddened to hear some Senators ask who we should believe in these circumstances when one of the parties to the conservation that is alleged to have taken place is somebody in whose veracity Senators have absolutely no belief. The public at large has very little belief in their veracity either, bearing in mind the continual denials by that party that he was ever a member of the IRA.

The Sinn Féin-IRA movement has been guilty of wholesale duplicity over this matter from the word go. It denied that any of its members were involved in the atrocity at Adare and sent out their political spokesmen who said they accepted the denials as being true. Having had conversations recently with some of the people who were involved in the investigation, I understand those denials were made so trenchantly at the time that they put the Garda Síochána on a false trail for a short period. The gardaí did not believe that anyone could have the brazen effrontery to make such a radical denial in circumstances which transpired later to be completely mendacious.

Ever since then the Sinn Féin movement has been pressing the Government to release those men ahead of time. That movement has been claiming, wrongly, that it had an agreement that they were comprehended within the terms of the Good Friday Agreement. For its part, the Government has said at all times, both then and since, that they were never so comprehended. I have spoken to officials in my Department who were present in Castle Buildings in Belfast at that time, and they are adamant that it was made clear to everybody who would listen that there was no question of their inclusion in that agreement. When it comes to questions of credibility and veracity, therefore, there can be no doubt that they were never comprehended within the terms of the Good Friday Agreement, and they will never be released on foot of that Agreement. Let it be clearly understood that they will never be released under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement in any circumstances whatsoever.

As Senators have remarked, it is now ten years since the IRA ceasefire first came into effect, and six years since the signing of the Good Friday Agreement by some of the parties in Castle Buildings in 1998. At this stage, it should be understood that the main obstacle to the full implementation of the Agreement has been the resolute, determined refusal by the provisional movement to deliver on its side of the bargain. Manufactured and specious issues constantly cloud the scene when the full implementation of that Agreement requires a number of simple things, one of which is a total and radical transformation of the situation in Northern Ireland in which members of the provisional movement move unambiguously, irreversibly and without equivocation from their role as the underpinnings of paramilitarism to exclusively peaceful and democratic politics.

Sinn Féin has engaged in a massive campaign of deception and propaganda. It has sought to create the illusion that it is a party, independent of the IRA, that acts as a broker between the IRA and political establishments North and South, and whose job it is to try to persuade the IRA that the circumstances have come in which to end the paramilitary campaign. Sinn Féin has sought to create the illusion that it is somehow distant from the IRA, independent of it and — as Gerry Adams attempted to beguile the Irish people into believing yesterday and today — that the party is governed by its annual conference and nothing else. Unfortunately, that is a radical and profound untruth.

While some aspects of my recent remarks in Limerick did not receive adequate attention, I sought to bring to public view material which was found in possession of the provisional movement. It states clearly the actual relationship between Sinn Féin and the IRA. These documents show that provisional IRA volunteers are required to believe the following:

That the provisional army council and its successors are the inheritors of the First and Second Dáil as a provisional government of the Irish Republic . . . this ethical fact should and must give moral strength to all volunteers and [note my words now] all members of every branch of the republican movement. The IRA — its leadership — is the lawful government of the Irish Republic. All other parliaments or assemblies claiming the right to speak for or to pass laws on behalf of the Irish people, are illegal assemblies, puppet governments of a foreign power and willing tools of occupying forces.

The text continues by stating that:

Volunteers must firmly believe, without doubt and without reservation, that, as members of the IRA, all orders issued by the army authority and all actions directed by the army authority are the legal orders and lawful actions of the government of the Irish Republic. This is one of the most important mainstays of the republican movement [which, as we heard earlier, includes Sinn Féin and all its branches] — the firm belief that all operations and actions directed by the army are, in effect, the lawful acts and legal actions of the government of all the Irish people.

Shortly after my own interview on radio yesterday, I heard Mr. Adams equivocating, wheeling around and trying to avoid the issue, but I challenge him to deny that that is his belief and the belief of all members of the republican movement, whatever part they play in either branch of that movement. It is a central tenet of Sinn Féin and the IRA that the IRA army council is the legitimate government of the Irish Republic, and that all its orders and decisions are lawful acts taken on behalf of the Irish people.

The significance of all that is that it radically defines the function of Sinn Féin as a political party. It is not an independent party, it is a party that operates on the supposition that there is an authority superior to it — part of the same movement it forms — which speaks with a legitimacy and lawful authority that is coercive and which all volunteers must accept as a fundamental and "ethical fact", as they term it. The consequence of that is that no member of Sinn Féin ever criticises the IRA. None of them has ever uttered one word of criticism of the IRA. None of them has ever condemned any action known to have been taken by the IRA. None of them has ever, on any occasion, challenged the IRA about any of its actions, nor in public have they distanced themselves from, or in any way repudiated, any action of the IRA. That is not just simply a matter of taste or political perspective; it is because the fundamental rule of the republican movement is that all its branches are subject to the authority of the IRA. As long as members of the provisional movement believe that to be the case, it follows that they cannot pose in politics as an independent political party. They cannot ask the rest of the community to accept them as a party which is free and engaging in exclusively democratic and peaceful means because in the last analysis they are not free. As long as they are shackled to this ideological view, there is an immovable impediment to their being involved in the institutions of government North or South. As long as that is their structure and that chain of authority exists within the provisional movement, there is an immovable impediment to their participating on the basis of ordinary democratic constitutional politics.

If we get to the stage where paramilitarism in Ireland ends, to the point where the army council of the IRA no longer holds sway over the provisional movement, and all the apparatus, structures and ideology of the provisional movement are transformed so that the IRA agrees to be part of the past, and the red line is drawn across the page book of history; if we get to the point where that can be done, and paramilitarism can end, with firearms put away or destroyed, dumped or buried in concrete — their disposal is a matter of indifference to me — and there is no more organised IRA criminality of any kind; and if the punishment beatings, torturings, exilings, attempted murders and incidents like those involving Bobby Toal are irreversibly and manifestly history, this country will have taken a massive step forward.

Despite anticipating taunts of hypocrisy, or a lack of credibility, it would be easy for me to leave the problem to others and not to even discuss how we might get to the desired situation. It would be easy for me to reside in a realm of moral purity in which instead of undertaking my duty as someone who passionately believes in democratic constitutional politics, I would forget all this and say no progress can be made. I could say I would not talk to anyone, did not want to hear about anything and would tell the IRA to return to me when it had wound up and decided to surrender. It would be easy for the Taoiseach to take that attitude too.

The hand of history, however, is on the shoulders of politicians and it demands of the elected members of our Government that they make efforts to get us from our current unacceptable position to one where this country, North and South, is freed from paramilitarism in its entirety. The hand of history on one's shoulder makes it clear to anyone who bears the responsibility of elected office in a society such as ours that one cannot simply say one will abdicate from the fulfilment and act of completion of the Good Friday Agreement. The potential for good is so huge, the potential to transform the lives, attitudes and the entire future of this island so big, that one cannot simply say one will have nothing to do with the peace process.

The Government has acted honourably and truthfully in all its dealings in these matters. I urge Members of this House and any other forum not to assume they know in its entirety what was being discussed in the past, or that they can draw judgments about the appropriateness of where the Government stood or did not stand at the time. As I said in Limerick recently, it was our understanding in April 2003, on the morning we went to meet President Bush and Prime Minister Blair in Hillsborough Castle, that sufficient time had been given to the provisional movement to organise executive and army conventions to bring about the end of paramilitarism in Northern Ireland. That was our understanding, and when walking up the path to Hillsborough Castle it became apparent to us for the first time that we had been massively shortchanged.

The Government is indefatigable in its pursuit of the full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement and is unafraid of rolling up its sleeves to work out what that fulfilment involves and how it can be brought about. Neither I nor any member of the Government will participate in a process whereby the release of these men is made into some appetiser or inducement to others to bring themselves to the point where they will then be in a position to shortchange us again. The Government is clear that this will not happen.

The Government's amendment encapsulates exactly where the Government stands, without equivocation. In very generous, and if I may use the phrase statesmanlike, words of a retired member of the Garda Síochána, Garda Ben O'Sullivan, if there was a case of going from one situation to a wholly different one, he would not, in particular circumstances, stand in the way of what was proposed.

I thank in particular the family of Detective Garda Jerry McCabe for its dignity and for the words the family members spoke in recent days. It has not been easy for them, thrown as they were into the centre of this maelstrom. They have said that they trust the Irish Government, and they are right to do so. Their trust will not be misplaced or abused. Anyone who considers these events must however realise that upholding our Constitution, the rule of law, the Garda Síochána and the democratic principles by which we all stand lies at the centre of the Government strategy, and that these elements are not expendable in pursuit of any accommodation with anybody in this country.

Among other evasions and obfuscations made recently by Mr. Gerry Adams, he challenged me in his eloquent and sweet words to put up or shut up regarding provisional criminality. It would of course suit the provisional movement if I were to disclose in public all I know about everything that movement is doing. People like Mr. Adams would feel well satisfied if by using the taunt "put up or shut up" they found out what the Irish Government knew in detail about what they were doing.

When I say that the Provisional IRA is involved in ongoing massive criminality North and South, I have spoken nothing but the unvarnished truth. Just as the provisional movement, in order to procure its ends, unleashed intimidation on a major scale after the killing of Jerry McCabe and the trial that followed, intimidation that has never been condemned by any member of Sinn Féin, it also uses intimidation to frighten its accomplices in crime within this State. The provisionals use physical intimidation and have shot a number of people in the legs. They have used moral intimidation to bring about a reign of fear, so that those who do their bidding in their massive stolen goods trade and in other criminal pursuits for profit, will never reveal what they know or act in a way which would assist a prosecution. That is the reality of which all senior provisional figures are aware. These high ranking officials of the provisional movement, if I can dignify them with that term, orchestrate this crime, step in when anything goes wrong and immediately act as the Mr. Fix Its making sure the criminality is allowed to proceed uninterrupted and unimpeded. Those people rub shoulders with household names in the Sinn Féin movement day in, day out, and let nobody be under any illusion about that.

If the challenge is put to me to put up or shut up, I will not make the elementary mistake of simply revealing Garda and Army intelligence to the provisional movement but will say on my honour as a democratically elected representative that every word I have spoken is true and that the majority of things said in response have been manifestly and deliberately false.

Crime is a huge business for the IRA. A House of Commons committee estimated that, through fuel laundering, cigarette smuggling and other activities, it was in receipt of £12 million sterling per annum.