PSNI officers have been forced to leave their weapons outside when entering Sinn Féin offices, a former senior police officer turned MLA has said.
North Antrim MLA Jon Burrows, who previously served as a PSNI superintendent has written to the Chief Constable Jon Boutcher to express deep concern at the alleged practice.
In the letter seen by The Irish News, Mr Burrows claims that Sinn Féin representatives have “demanded that PSNI officers remove their personal protection firearms before entering Sinn Féin offices to deal with members of the public or on occasion when attending community meetings.”
“I have ascertained that this happened specifically in West Belfast and at other locations in Northern Ireland,” he wrote.
In the letter, Mr Burrows went on to describe the alleged practice as “unacceptable” and “an outrageous example of political interference in policing”.
“Such demands place individual officers in an intolerable position, undermine operational independence, and compromise their personal safety,” he continued.
“It is my understanding that in a number of cases officers have rightly refused to comply with these demands. However, I am also concerned to learn that some officers may have been pressured to do so. This is completely inappropriate and cannot be allowed to continue. It is also dangerous in that firearms would be left in a car in a public place.”
The Irish News understands that the alleged requests were made by Sinn Féin representatives in west Belfast, Derry and Strabane, and elsewhere in the north within the last two years.
It is thought that the officers involved were from the neighbourhood teams and in some cases complied with the alleged requests from Sinn Féin officials but that a directive was due to be issued in recent days telling officers not to grant such requests in future.
Jon Burrows became the UUP MLA for North Antrim in 2025 after serving as police for 22 years.
He retired in 2021 from the force on health grounds.
The Irish News contacted Sinn Féin but has yet to receive a response.
“Police take the safety and security of our officers very seriously, this includes the provision of personal protection weapons, the carriage of which unfortunately remains necessary,” a PSNI spokesperson said.
“We are not aware of any recent incidents when police were requested not to carry PPWs when attending specific locations or meetings referred to nor have officers been directed not to carry PPWs in such circumstances.”
by IPlayFifaOnSemiPro
19 comments
Pretty outrageous if true, but as usual, not surprising
What’s the problem here? We dont allow them to have guns at community meetings in South Armagh either.
You dont come armed to a community meeting unless you consider the community your enemy.
What is the issue? Nothing says they can’t have armed officers outside providing security. Pretty sure the chief constable doesn’t walk around with a sidearm at his hip when attending events as he has a protection detail. Why can’t similar be applied here when looking to build engagement with communities their current and former colleagues have persecuted in the past?
Standard practice to remove firearms when entering certain premises outside of emergencies (government buildings, schools, etc) in Europe where police are armed as part of their standard kit.
Only here would this perfectly reasonable request be considered an issue.
Is this the Unionism can do? Nationalist politicians request that the police don’t enter their offices armed to the teeth? Wow, what an incredibly unreasonable thing to ask.
Nolan was desperate to get some traction with this one. I can’t see the issue, if you need to be armed to go talk to Michelle at the office you have bigger issues.
It’s fully understandable that they are asked to leave their weapons outside given an RUC officer, Allen Moore, walked into a SF office with a shotgun and murdered 3 folk; Paddy Loughran, Pat McBride and Michael O’Dwyer and left two others severy injured, Pat Wilson and Kate Larkin.
Michael had his 2 year old child sitting on his knee when he was murdered.
The people that had arrived to give aid were then assaulted by the responding RUC officers, with one officer punching a pregnant women in the stomach with his rifle butt hospitalising her, where she very nearly lost the baby.
Why the fuck do the cops need to bring a firearm into a political office anyway?
Who gives a fuck? No one worth listening to.
In 1992 a serving RUC man (maybe an RUC reservist) walked into the Falls Road office and murdered 3 people.
That aside, I don’t see the issue in asking the PSNI to not be armed when entering. Surely when they visit schools or whatever they don’t go in with loaded weapons? Could be wrong of course but I wouldn’t imagine so.
And you care because?
Op making themselves look like the right bigot in the comments here
Nevermind the fact RUC officers walked into a SF office and murdered and assaulted innocent people, why on earth would anyone need to be armed entering a political office. It’s a completely reasonable and normal request
Considering a police officer in the past walked into the Sinn Féin offices and indiscriminately opened fire killing three people, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask them not to be armed in an office.
Faux outrage
Burrows is an attention seeker. Since he was co-opted he clearly wants to be the next leader of the Ulster Unionist Party.
Yea, the swagger goes the minute the gun belt goes ..
So just to be clear this arrangement has been going on since 2007 and since then it’s safe to assume there hasn’t been any attacks at these meetings otherwise we’d have heard of it before now. This says a couple of things, firstly it shows Sinn Féin’s commitment to the PSNI much to the ire of anti-agreement republicans (no cops setup) but secondly if some anti-agreement groups didn’t know that the PSNI weren’t carrying at these engagements before, with the help of Burrows and Nolan they do now. So well done lads! If brains were a disease you’d both be in the best of health. Or you could look at it a more cynical way and think they’d like nothing more for a cop to be attacked to justify making a mountain out of a molehill in the first place. I swear the statement about the IRA decommissioning being the most destabilising thing for political unionism rings true with each passing day.
Shocking and chilling. A political party controlling our police force. Questions to be answered by SF!
We’re watching from R.O.I. I certainly wouldn’t be voting for a party that would order our police around. This is orwellian.
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