SDLP leader Mr Mark Durkan has called for the home service battalion of the Royal Irish Regiment (RIR) to be scrapped.
His comments follow a meeting last night between Northern Ireland Secretary Paul Murphy and Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon on the future of the 3,000 strong Northern Ireland units.
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Mr Durkan said: "The RIR home regiments should be disbanded. At a time when we are bringing about a representative police service and peaceful normality, it is wrong to keep army battalions on duty here in the North drawn exclusively from one side of the community".
The SDLP leader said the RIR did not command the confidence of the nationalist community and should be wound up.
"It is deeply ironic that the same unionist politicians who give out about the political interference in policing are leading the campaign for the RIR to be kept on despite the British army's own assessment that it will no longer be required.
"If people were serious about the need to back up policing then they would focus on ensuring that money which would otherwise be spent on the RIR and others will all be added to the policing budget. Maintaining the RIR would literally be at the expense of better policing," he added.
The future of the RIR is expected to top the agenda as the Ulster Unionist Party's 860-strong ruling council debates the Joint Declaration Document designed to restore the power-sharing administration.
PA