Is expected, the Patton A commission on the RUC produced a version of the peace process writ small. Like the peace process, it nowhere dealt with reality, replacing grim facts of repression and sectarianism with post-modernist mumboculture and 400U5 The Royal Ulster constabulary, or Kul was formca alongstuc the birth of the new partionca state in the North of of Ireland. From the start. it was both a vicious colonial police force and the sectarian army for the Protestant parliament at Stormont. In the past 30 years it has been accused of sectarian bias, torture, a "shoot to kill" policy, involvement in the murder of lawyers and human rights activists and routine collusion with paramilicary death squads. are supported by a series of UN reports ignored by the British.
Evidence of collusion was provided by lorry loads of RUC intelligence files, providing information on Catholic civilians, which were readily available from loyalist death squads. The force has recently faced serious allegations about the murders of solicitors Pat Finucane and Rosemary Nelson.
None of this was included in the commission's terms of reference, which were "time for a new start". It was to act within the remit of the Good Friday agreement. Its task was to adjust the RUC to the new society proposed by the agreement.
Entirely absent from the agrecment and in the commission's report was a recognition of the colonial nature of the Northern Irish society or opposition to sectarianism.
The proposal is to share out sectarian privilege - to have a new police force that will. mirror every level the institutionalised sectarianism of the new society. It will not of course be equal sectarian privilege. Unionism will remain the driving seat. Behind the scenes, real power will rest where it always does, with the British.
Of the 175 proposals, only seven deal with the question of human rights, and only one is concrete -that officers should take a human rights oath!
More significant proposals are taken under the heading of culture and ethos - again, there are seven such proposals.
The main ones are to retain the RUC under a new name - the Northern Ireland Police service (NIPS), and that the flying of the Union Jack outside RUC stations should stop.
Outsiders can only stand aghast at the idea that a flag routinely used to signal sectarian intimidaton should constantiy be dis. played by the police, or that the end of the practice should be seen as a concession. Yet the relatively A column from in the background. ommendations are intended to aid co-option. The main thrust of this is 28 proposals on the compo sition of the force and recruitment. Number 121 calls for an equal number of Catholics and Protestants to be recruited. Scattered through the report are hints that former republican activists are to be absorbed into the state forces. For example, the full time reserve is to be abolished but the part time reserve is to be expanded. Non-operational sections of the RUC are to be privatised and tenders groups, including community groups, are to be encouraged.
report suggests that the The force is to change from a unipolar sectarianism to a bi-polar sectarianism, giving the national• ist bourgeoisie jobs and political influence. But this is simply aspiration - the real RUC is to continue in business as a unionist force.
The proposals for equal presently illegal under existing employment legislation. Even the most optimistic forecasts talk about 20 or 30 years to make the changes - to arrive at a revamp of the old colonial royal Irish constabulary (RIC) - which was over 90 per cent Catholic.
The proposals on size and public order gives the game away. The force is to remain at over double its size at the start of the troubles. It is to expand the part-time reserve and is charged with attaining sutticient torce to pul down substantial public disorder - that is any return of revolt.
'Nationalist' and other supporters of reform argued that to establish a clear break with the past, the Commission should recom mend the withdrawal of emergency powers. However, Patten, while importantly advocating the closure of the holding centres and increased regulation of emer. gency laws, actually echoes the government view that such powers should go but only when the security situation allows.
Similarly, the report does not call for an immediate end of the use of plastic bullets. The current command structure which officers implicated in ill-treatment of detainees, tions and collusion with loyalist paramilitaries - stays intact. The RUC is to remain armed and retain the use of plastic bullets - in fact it is to widen its arsenal to give it greater flexibility in repression.
What emerges after the dust settles is in fact a major offensive against the working class and progressive forces.
They would change the sectarian character of the UC but not They would make the end it force more effective and include 19 points on co-operation tual would integrate the Gardai - the police force of the formally indepenacat soutner staid aid new police co-operation covering the two islands and with a massive database on political militants.
What gives the offensive its special edge is that, while the proposed changes are on the far horizon, nationalist support for the police is demanded now in proposals 113-117. One group of workers - teachers - are specifically listed as required to endorse and recruit for the RUC.
The response from the nationalist bourgeoisie has been one of enthusiastic support. The Dublin government, the SDLP and the Catholic church have immediately endorsed the report.
Sinn Fein are described as being more cautious. In fact they are moving through a set routine which in the past has signalled a way of accepting difficult clements of the peace process. The way in which this works is that the republican leadership, who rule with a rod of iron, disarmingly put down their mantle of power and confess that they don't the They can't decide if this is the new police service or the old RUC!
This opens the way for consulta. tion with a conrusco and acmor alised base whom the Sinn Fein leadership patronisingly describe as the most politically sophisticated in Europe while sternly within their movement. They provide plenty of clues to indicate the correct answer. The August festival centred on a poster of a demonstrator being attacked by the RUC. One of his armbands bears the slogan "Dis. band the RUC!" - but this is almost illegible. Below the new slogan is revealed - new police service now!
Riding under the label of anonymous human rights activists, Sinn Fein provide a ten-point ruler that supporters are to use to measure progress. Because this focuses mainly on an equality agenda, the Patton report passes some points and fails others The community paper Andersonstoton News summarised the remorseless reformist logic of this in an editorial. We should accept the "step forward" and work for further changes. In fact the base of the republiwho have been at war with the RUC for the past 30 years, are shocked by the Patton The widespread sense of opposition lacks political expres sion given the lack of a republiresistance that not primarily military.
Right now the resistance comes from the far right with the Unionist rejection of any change to the RUC. The likelihood is that the peace process will fall to Imperialism will put all the gains that it has made so far in its back pocket and look for a further retreat from republicans to begin the process all over again.
There is one danger for the forces of capitalism and imperialism. ian siege of the Garvaghy Road Icave open the danger of a direct confrontation berween the RUC and the nationalist working class. Given the levels of demobilisation it is not the most likely outcome, but if it occurred it would succo away in an instant all the pretence of reform in the Patton report!