‘Bubbly personality on jet’
IN the male-dominated world of the Air Corps, Lisa Smith stood out, former foreign minister Dermot Ahern has recalled. She was a ‘pleasant, bubbly’ personality on board the Government jet, and the pair bonded, as they were both brought up in Dundalk, Co. Louth. The pair discovered that one of the pilots also had family in Louth, and they joked about the Wee County’s contingent taking over the Government jet. Ms Smith, 37, served as cabin crew on the Government jet during her time on the Defence Forces, flying across the globe with Mr Ahern and other senior politicians. He recalled meeting her between 2004 and 2008, as he regularly travelled abroad for work. He told the Irish Daily Mail that he was ‘astounded’ to learn that she is being detained on suspicion of being an Isis bride. ‘I would have been the most frequent user of the Government jet in the Cabinet because of that [position as foreign minister] and I would have come in contact with her, I think, during a two-year period over that time,’ Mr Ahern said.
‘I remember her being on the jet. She appeared and immediately I met her the first time I realised she was from Dundalk because she had a distinctive Dundalk accent.
‘She was a very pleasant, bubbly girl, very nice disposition. We always used to chat about what was happening at home in Dundalk. ‘That’s particularly how I got to make her acquaintance.’ The former Fianna Fáil minister went on to describe her as someone who got along with her colleagues, and was ‘very efficient and very good at her job’. The Mail columnist added that there was a running joke on board that people from Dundalk, including Ms Smith, were ‘taking over’ the jet.
He said: ‘There used to be a great slagging among some of the colleagues because one of the pilots had a Dundalk connection as well even though he wasn’t from Dundalk.
‘His aunt was a neighbour of mine so we used to joke that the crowd from Dundalk were taking over the Air Corps and the Government jet.’
However, he was unaware that Ms Smith had later converted to Islam. ‘I understand that a number of years later... when she was still in the Defence Forces, she converted to Islam,’ he said.
‘I didn’t know that. The first thing I knew was yesterday when I picked up the paper.’
Regarding yesterday’s revelations about her, he said: ‘I remember her well and she was a very nice girl. I was astounded to be honest.’
‘She was a very nice girl’
THE remarks by Northern Secretary Karen Bradley last week – when she said that the deaths at the hands of the military and the police during the Troubles ‘were not crimes’ – rightly caused an outcry in certain sections of Northern society. Nationalist politicians were out quickly condemning them. Mrs Bradley subsequently tried to take the heat out of the matter by adding that she was not referring to specific cases, but was expressing a ‘general’ view.
But this made matters even worse, especially given that these subsequent comments failed to include any sign of an apology to the many bereaved families still waiting for justice in regard to the murders of their loved-ones. As the level of condemnation regarding her remarks gathered pace, she obviously decided to try again, as she said herself, to ‘turn back the clock’ to before she opened her mouth on this issue in the first place.
She chose a one-on-one interview with RTÉ’s Tommie Gorman to say how ‘profoundly sorry’ she was for the hurt and offence caused by her remarks. She suggested that her offending words were ‘a slip of the tongue’.
Unlawful
For me what was most worrying about her original comments was that she stated that the military or police perpetrators were ‘acting under orders and under instruction’. This raises the perennial question, asked during the decades of the Troubles, which is: did the UK system acquiesce in the unlawful killing of civilians in the North?
Over many years of the Troubles, and especially when I was in Foreign Affairs and Justice as minister, I met numerous families of the bereaved. Nothing would convince many of them that there wasn’t collusion and premeditation involved in the murders.
Mrs Bradley’s remarks are all the more worrying given that they were made in advance of decision expected soon by the Northern Public Prosecution Service as to whether any former British soldiers should be charged over the Bloody Sunday killings. There are conflicting reports as to what the decision will be. Maybe, by her remarks, she was attempting to pre with pare the ground before that decision comes out. If no-one is to be brought before the courts, there will be uproar in nationalist areas, while there will be some, on the other hand, in unionist sectors who will be worried that more prosecutions for other killings will follow, especially against former members of the disbanded RUC. Families of the bereaved must have been even more uneasy when they heard UK prime minister Theresa May stating, last week, that her government was considering the introduction of legislation to ensure that British soldiers will not be unfairly pursued through the courts. Just as worrying are the remarks, also last week, by former UK foreign secretary Boris Johnson, who wondered ‘what signal does it send out to our brave armed forces’ if British soldiers are to be prosecuted for offences carried out decades ago. One thing Mrs Bradley’s remarks do is reveal a mindset which clearly still exists in large sections of the UK’s political elite, despite the warming of relationships across these two islands.
Since Mrs Bradley took up her position as Northern Secretary, I have not been impressed by many of her utterances and actions. For instance, just over a year ago, she admitted that, before she was appointed to the position in Northern Ireland, she ‘didn’t understand things like when elections are fought – people who are nationalists don’t vote for unionists and vice versa’.
It was often said in British political circles that for a UK politician to be appointed to the office of Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, it was regarded as a punishment or demotion. Having said that, there were times when politicians of a high calibre spent time in Hillsborough Castle. A few names come to mind as heavy hitters, such as Merlyn Rees, Douglas Hurd, Tom King, Peter Brooke and Patrick Mayhew. During my ministerial career, I had direct dealings many Northern Secretaries, namely Mo Mowlam, Peter Mandelson, John Reid, Peter Hain, Paul Murphy, Shaun Woodward and Owen Paterson. I found all of them to be hugely committed to helping efforts to solve the political and other difficulties which dogged our two islands.
What has astounded me, in recent times, is how more recent incumbents in the Northern Secretary position have been strong proponents of Brexit. I think especially of Owen Paterson, Theresa Villiers and James Brokenshire. I would have thought that their immersion in matters to do with Northern Ireland would have educated them about the difficulties which Brexit would have on the complex relationships on this island.
Surely, for instance, their experience in the North would have made them realise that the scourge of cross-border smuggling was dramatically reduced by reason of the fact that both parts of Ireland were within the Single Market and the Customs Union?
Smuggling
And that anything that would change that situation would be manna from heaven for criminal groups, allowing them to resurrect their smuggling operations? And that the seamless movement of people, goods and services which we, on the island, have been used to in the last few decades would be dramatically jeopardised by Brexit?
If no-one else within the Tory party saw it coming, these three MPs with Northern Secretary experience should have been able to warn their colleagues that their exit from the EU, in the context of the Irish border, would be extremely difficult to achieve, quite apart from having adverse ramifications for all who live on the island. And yet, particularly, Mr Paterson and Ms Villiers have been vocal cheerleaders for Brexit. Their stint in the North must not have had an influence on their thought-processes when it comes to their judgment on Brexit.
Coming back to Mrs Bradley, her statements on Brexit have been merely to parrot the nonsensical mantras used by her leader, Mrs May, particularly the one about ‘not going back to the borders of the past’. Mrs Bradley’s comments last week have not inspired confidence in her ability, in the future, to be even-handed in her dealings in the North.
While her position as Northern Secretary hangs by a thread, she cannot afford to put her foot in it again. Otherwise, it’s the political trapdoor for her.