The Guardian Late last Saturday night members of the RUC intercepted a Real IRA mortar bomb at Derrylin near Enniskillen. The consequences if they hadn't hardly bear thinking about. The professionalism of those police officers almost certainly prevented another Poppy Day massacre and the serious personal injury and damage to the peace process that would have ensued. That planned attack was not an isolated incident. Another police officer is still seriously ill in hospital after the previous week's attack at the police station in Castlewellan, and there are concerns about the possibility of further attacks on either side of the Irish sea in the run-up to Christmas.
Terrorism is still a direct, active threat in Northern Ireland.
Because we believe that to defeat terrorism and accelerate the transition to a decent, peaceful, civic society in Northern Ireland you have to create a police service drawn from the whole community and whose writ extends to the whole community. Because, to be effective, a police service has to be representative. And effectiveness at root is what the new beginning is all about. I understand the concerns of those who say that the police should not be distracted at a time of continuing violence. And that politics needs to be working in a stable environment before the kind of accountability mechanisms we envisage are introduced.