The Deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland, Mr Seamus Mallon, made a passionate attack on the Police (Northern Ireland) Bill yesterday, saying it had diminished and reduced the proposals contained in the Patten report.
During the second reading debate of the Bill in the House of Commons, Mr Mallon said the report had been condemned and scorned, but he had not observed the "clever" way to deal with Patten until the publication of the Bill.
In a stinging attack on the draft legislation, Mr Mallon said the clever way to deal with Patten was: "You take it, you espouse it, you emasculate it, you diminish it and you reduce it from what it is intended to do."
However, if the Bill was properly amended, the SDLP would be in a position to encourage young nationalists to join the police. "Get this Bill right and we will do that," Mr Mallon said.
The Patten report did not contain everything the SDLP had wanted, "but it was a blueprint for policing" with which everyone could identify and for which everyone could assume responsibility. Christopher Patten was "the first person in the history of the Northern Ireland state who laid down the foundations with which we may solve policing".
After the publication of the re port, the SDLP had gone further, he said, and indicated it would put people on the policing board and encourage young people to join the police, but only on the basis of the full and faithful implementation of the report.
However, he was disappointed that others had not assumed their responsibilities with regard to Patten when the report was published.
Expressing his concerns "right through the Bill", Mr Mallon said the Secretary of State retained the power to decide whether to implement key recommendations on "symbolic matters". He said the argument about symbolism, for example, was not between nationalists and unionists but about the governance of Northern Ireland and grappling with the particular problems that involved.