Unionist 'insecurity' caused by treating NI differently post-Brexit, MPs hear

​Dr Sean Brennan, an independent researcher who specialises in work in the community sector and the challenges of reintegrating loyalist ex-prisoners back into society, was speaking as he gave evidence to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee on the impact of paramilitarism on society in the region.

"There is that insecurity within the wider unionist community that they thought that our place within the UK was agreed, but then with Brexit they see that they're being kind of treated slightly differently," he said.

"You can see then from that perspective why loyalist paramilitaries in particular feel the need to remain because they feel that they can't trust London, and that they're going to be sold out and therefore they have to defend the people."

He emphasised that it could not be left to communities to do the heavy lifting on their own, adding that "positive elements" were often "overwhelmed".

Dr Brennan added: "It's not about tackling one issue. It's about a multi-agency approach and it is very challenging to do.

"There is no sense of pretending otherwise”.

Dr Brennan also described a sense of "hopelessness" in some marginalised communities, and the impact of drugs on the vulnerable.

"We need to focus on the structural transformations as well as the community transformations because without one, you can't have the other and then we're just going into an ongoing process of sustaining the deprivation that we're trying to transform."

Dr Aaron Edwards, a lecturer at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, told the committee there is a need to "deradicalise" young loyalists in.

He previously worked on major projects to help loyalist paramilitaries transition away from violence.

Dr Edwards described paramilitary groups as "complex organisations" and "networks deeply embedded in the most marginalised and deprived parts of Northern Ireland".

Public support for the various groupings was described as "ebbing and flowing", but not "widespread".

"The political dimension has lessened since the ceasefires (in 1994), however since the Brexit referendum and subsequent protest actions on the streets we have seen new life breathed into these old antiquated paramilitary structures," he told the committee of MPs.

Dr Edwards contended that warning signs for the disorder in April 2021 were "missed" due to a focus by security forces on the leadership of the organisations.

"In April 2021 there was an outbreak of sporadic violence, mainly from within the loyalist community, and those sorts of signs were missed because most of the surveillance and engagement was with leadership and not with the grassroots," he said.

Dr Edwards was critical of attempts by the Stormont administration to tackle paramilitarism.

"We see hard evidence of the police and Paramilitary Crime Task Force raiding and being very successful, the various organisations that it looks at," he said.

"But for those who have been around quite a long time and have lived with paramilitarism all their lives and still continue to see paramilitaries with some kind of standing or stature in their communities, I think there's a shaking of heads and all I can really see the strategy doing at the moment is mowing the grass ... essentially, occasionally there are weeds that need pulled out by the roots

“There are more loyalist paramilitaries today than there were 30 years ago, and I think that’s a really disturbing reality.

"Quite what they’re doing is open for serious questions.”

Quoting Progressive Unionist Party leader Billy Hutchinson on his call for “mindsets to be decommissioned”, Dr Edwards said: “I think that’s correct even today.

"Trying to deradicalise youth particularly who feel that they need to join the fray, years after the major armed conflict ended, is something I think we need to address.”