There was an interesting meeting recently between the tánaiste, Micheál Martin, and Superintendent Gerry Murray, the chairman of the Catholic Police Guild of Northern Ireland (CPG). The guild is an association of Catholic police men and women who serve in the PSNI.

The Irish News reported how there was reference to the influence of the GAA in encouraging or discouraging people from the nationalist and republican community from joining the police.

After the meeting the tánaiste said the police were not getting the support in the Catholic community that they needed and called on the GAA to be bolder in encouraging Catholics to join the PSNI and to follow through on the principles of Patten.

It should be noted than on the issue of recruitment, those principles get constantly misquoted. Patten recommended that the 50/50 recruitment method, which gave Catholics a slight advantage over others, should only last until Catholic representation reached 30% (where it is) and Patten’s report then challenged the nationalist, republican community to take ownership of bringing the Catholic recruitment to its proper representation.