The first 44 recruits to the Police Service of Northern Ireland graduated yesterday, marking the visible end of the RUC.
While there was no denying the military element of the ceremony as the 31 men and 13 women in their new uniforms marched out to be reviewed by senior officers, the PSNI band had chosen a light-hearted programme to accompany proceedings.
Beethoven's Ode to Joy was quickly followed by Whiskey in the Jar and the Leaving of Liverpool. The symbolism of the ceremony could not have been lost on anybody. The old Royal Ulster Constabulary standard was handed over to the Church of Ireland Dean of Belfast, the Very Rev Houston McKelvey, for safekeeping at St Anne's Cathedral. Then representatives of the North's four main churches dedicated the PSNI's new flag in a brief ceremony before it was jointly raised by one of the trainers, Constable Blair, and one of the recruits, Student Officer Knox. The flag was then lowered to half-mast as a mark of respect to the Queen Mother.
Sir Ronnie Flanagan, who was scheduled to speak and did so without notes, encouraged the new recruits to work with courtesy and courage and "in a new ethos to serve all the people in Northern Ireland". Sir Ronnie admitted there had been RUC "imperfections".
He went on to commend Commissioner Pat Byrne, saying he was "as good an officer as I have met in my policing career". He then made a presentation to which Mr Byrne was invited to reply.
After the ceremony political representatives hotly debated the appropriateness of the Garda Commissioner's impromptu address. While the SDLP's Mr Joe Byrne saw his presence as "a symbolic demonstration of the mutual needs of people North and South in terms of policing", unionists were less sanguine about it. The DUP's Mr Ian Paisley jnr said the ceremony had been "hijacked".
"The important place the recruits should have had was given to the Garda Commissioner. I had no idea this was going to happen and I am very angry. It was a very bad way of starting off the proceedings for these new recruits. This is not even political correctness, it is rank hypocrisy and lies," he said.
The UUP's Mr Fred Cobain said while what Mr Byrne had said was relevant to officers North and South, his unscheduled speech had been "vintage Ronnie Flanagan underhand tactics".
Among the recruits' families,however, Mr Byrne hardly caused a stir. One mother who did not want to give her name said it had been a "lovely, dignified" ceremony. "We couldn't be prouder of our son. I thought the commissioner spoke extremely well. But then there has been a lot of co-operation between the two services for a long time, which is exactly how it should be."
The graduates have finished 20 weeks' study and take up formal duties in August. They will earn £18,000 a year and now begin a two-year probationary period.