Senior PSNI boss received 'privileged treatment' compared to junior officers facing disciplinary action, MLAs hear

A senior police officer who oversaw a discipline process later deemed to be unlawful received “privileged treatment,” MLAs have been told.

Speaking during Members’s Statement in the assembly, TUV leader Jim Allister said he was raising the issue to highlight the “striking contrast” between how Deputy Chief Constable Mark Hamilton and two junior officers were treated.

In September last year, the Police Federation passed a vote of no confidence in Mr Hamilton over his handling of a high-profile incident on Belfast's Ormeau Road that led to two officers being disciplined.

That police rank and file vote came after a High Court judge ruled that the disciplinary process the two junior officers faced had been unlawful.

However, Mr Hamilton, away from work since September when he underwent an unplanned medical procedure, will spend the remainder of this year on a secondment that will involve work with Stormont's Department of Justice and the National Police Chiefs' Council.

Mr Allister said: “The High Court has ruled that the disciplinary process that he oversaw was unlawful, and the court delivered that judgement with scathing criticism of the processes.

"Unsurprisingly, the Police Federation... passed a vote of no confidence in Mr Hamilton, who then went on the sick.

"The Policing Board, which failed to take any disciplinary action and failed to hold Mr Hamilton to any accountability, has now approved his secondment – his cosy, enriching secondment – to the Department of Justice.

"It is a vivid illustration of a two-tier approach: junior officers are relentlessly pursued, even unlawfully, as in this case, and the perpetrator is validated, rewarded and accommodated with a lucrative move to the Department of Justice. What a farce.

“There was no follow-up investigation of Mr Hamilton's conduct, and no accountability was required by the Policing Board.”

Mr Allister added: “Of course, we have a parallel, to some extent, in the Police Ombudsman's office itself, where the Police Ombudsman continues to preside over cases against PSNI officers while she has a relevant investigation proceeding, which seems to have been quietly forgotten, into events at her home.

"The question is this: why is there that two-tier approach? Why is there a bye ball and reward for the high and mighty, and, for the lowly officer, there is total pursuit, even when that is unlawful pursuit?”