IRA crocodile tears

WITh tears in his eyes, self-confessed IRA bomb maker Michael hayes told the BBC last week that he was sorry 21 innocent people were killed in the Birmingham pub attacks in 1974.

The bombs weren’t intended to kill, he said, blaming the deaths on an inadvertent delay before police were warned. he even claimed to have defused a third device when the extent of the carnage became clear.

These pathetic excuses – and his refusal to admit to his full role – have unsurprisingly sickened the relatives of those who lost their lives and who, decades later, still haven’t seen the killers sent to prison.

To make matters worse, there is no sign of police action resulting from the interview, despite hayes’s admission of his ‘collective responsibility’ for involvement in the IRA’s bombing campaign across Britain, and despite MPs demanding he be extradited from his Dublin home.

While this terrorist parades his hollow remorse on TV, the disgraceful witch-hunt of British troops involved in the Troubles continues. What an affront to justice. The Mail congratulates former Guardian newspaper boss Dame Carolyn McCall on her appointment as the new chief executive of ITV. On day one, she would do well to watch an episode of the unseemly, demeaning and sleazy TV spectacle that is Love Island, and ask herself: Is this the kind of programme she’d like her own children to watch?