Spooks believed Donaldson was a ‘double double agent’
CONNLA YOUNG CRIME and SECURITY CORRESPONDENT, Irish News, April 4th, 2026
BRITISH intelligence and members of the RUC believed Denis Donaldson was a ‘double-double agent’.
Fresh details about the informer and events surrounding his exposure have emerged on the 20th anniversary of his death.
The ex-Sinn Féin official was shot dead in April 2006 at a remote cottage in Co Donegal after being exposed as a Special Branch and MI5 agent.
The lethal attack was later claimed by the now-defunct Real IRA, although Mr Donaldson’s family has branded the admission “bogus”.
Sources familiar with the Donaldson case have also revealed how he was recruited as an informer by RUC Special Branch in the 1980s.
While Donaldson, who was known by the codename ‘O’Neill’, claimed he had been compromised during a vulnerable time in his life, sources say he was recruited after being caught shoplifting in Belfast city centre.
It is understood the prominent republican was caught trying to walk from a British Home Stores outlet with a stolen suitcase.
He was brought to Musgrave Street RUC station, where he was approached by Special Branch and agreed to work for them.
Cover may have been blown
Reference during court hearing related to ‘Stormontgate’ may have blown Donaldson’s cover
Denis Donaldson was shot dead at a cottage in Co Donegal, left, in April 2006
Sources suggest the speed at which Donaldson was turned raised immediate suspicions in some quarters, with his recruitment being viewed almost like a “walk in”.
It has now been suggested some police officers formed the view that Donaldson was a ‘double-double agent’.
A double-double agent would mean Donaldson was sent by the republican movement to offer himself as an informer, so that the IRA could gather information about how Special Branch worked.
At the time of his arrest and recruitment, Donaldson was highly regarded in the republican movement and later held positions of influence.
From the Short Strand area of east Belfast, he is believed to have joined the IRA in the mid-1960s and is said to have taken part in the ‘Battle of St Matthew’s’ in defence of the Catholic church after it was attacked by loyalists in 1970.
A former republican prisoner, he was famously photographed in 1975 inside Long Kesh prison with his arm draped around the shoulders of Bobby Sands, who went on to die in the 1981 hunger strike.
A prominent figure across Ireland, he was a link man for the republican movement during the Drumcree parades dispute in Portadown and was regularly seen on the Garvaghy Road during the tension filled years of the mid-1990s.
Sources have previously suggested Donaldson represented the IRA’s ‘general headquarters’ and was involved in discussions to defend the nationalist area if authorities forced through a controversial Orange Order parade in 1998.
Key figure in PIRA and Sinn Fein
He was also a key figure in Sinn Féin.
Sources say one of his roles was to act as a conduit between rural districts and the party’s Belfast-based leadership.
He was a regular visitor to outlying constituencies as Sinn Féin attempted to build a base in the years after the 1998 Good Friday Agreement was signed.
In the late 1980s, he was sent by republican leadership to the US and was later accused of trying to undermine the prisoner support group, Irish Northern Aid (Noraid).
At the time, a prominent Noraid official, Martin Galvin, raised concerns with republicans in Ireland about Donaldson but these were dismissed.
Donaldson was eventually thrust into the public spotlight in 2002 when an alleged IRA spy-ring was exposed at Stormont.
At the time of his arrest, he described himself as a “Sinn Féin Group Administrator in Parliament Buildings”.
the fledgling administration.
A prosecution involving Donaldson and two other men, William Mackessy and his son-in law, Ciaran Kearney, was dropped in December 2005.
Within days, Donaldson was outed as an informer, although some believe there may have been a second agent involved in the murky ‘Stormontgate’ affair whose identity has yet to be publicly revealed.
The exact role played by Donaldson during his years as a state asset has come under fresh scrutiny two decades after his death.
It is understood that despite agreeing to work with Special Branch, Donaldson rarely contacted police, and they normally had to contact him.
It is believed that, despite being well placed within the republican movement, Donaldson provided mostly “strategic information” about Sinn Féin and that intelligence relating to the IRA was ‘low grade’.
Some of those with knowledge of the case took the view that Donaldson may have been a republican plant, tasked with gathering information about how Special Branch worked, how they handled assets and general operating procedures.
Sources say that despite these suspicions, Donaldson saw first-hand some of the techniques used by intelligence agencies.
It is believed that during meetings he was routinely put into cars before being transferred to other vehicles and at times made to lie down in the boot.
These measures were deployed from both a security perspective and to have a “psychological” impact on Donaldson.
Highly trained handlers
The informer was managed by a team of detectives and was usually met by several “highly trained” Special Branch officers.
It is suggested the “highest level” of operating procedures were engaged at every meeting involving Donaldson because he was so well known and had a public profile.
Caution was also taken to ensure the informer was not provided with any information that may have been useful to him or others.
THE Irish News understands Donaldson met his handlers in the days before the Stormont spy-ring controversy exploded more than 20 years ago.
Although recruited by Special Branch, MI5 was also involved in running him at an early stage.
Despite their initial involvement, the agency later withdrew from meeting him.
It is understood that decision was taken after the organisation received “highly classified intelligence” confirming that Donaldson had been a ‘double double agent’.
Although the spy body believed Donaldson was of limited value, they still wanted the police to keep him on their books, it is suggested.
Sources with knowledge of Donaldson’s time as an informer suspect the well-placed asset was also answering directly to a senior figure in the republican movement.
While in the US, Donaldson befriended a man suspected by police of being involved in a break-in at Special Branch headquarters in Castlereagh in March 2002.
Larry Zaitschek moved to Ireland where he worked as a chef at Castlereagh.
The audacious break-in operation resulted in the IRA securing a large amount of Special Branch material, some of which related to police informers.
A prosecution against the US citizen, who denied any involvement in the plot, later collapsed after the PSNI said they could not disclose all relevant material and conceded he would not receive a fair trial.
While mystery has surrounded how Donaldson was recruited for two decades, a question mark has also hung over how he was eventually exposed.
It is now being suggested that an inadvertent reference during a court hearing linked to ‘Stormontgate’ may have been the catalyst for blowing his cover.
Public Interest Immunity
Sources say that as part of the spy-ring legal process, a Public Interest Immunity (PII) procedure was undertaken and hearings held.
PII certificates are issued when authorities do not want information to enter the public domain.
During one closed court hearing, Denis Donaldson’s name was mentioned as being an informer, sources say.
It is claimed this information was circulated by several people, including a police officer before being passed on to a journalist.
The PSNI was subsequently contacted.
This, in turn, triggered an ‘alert’ during which senior PSNI officers are said to have discussed their ‘duty of care’ to Donaldson.
A then prominent police officer was tasked with making contact with Donaldson to tell him he was about to be named by the media.
Police later learned their high-profile asset had gone to Sinn Féin and provided the party with an account of his activities.
In the days after being outed, Donaldson was debriefed by members of the republican movement.
It is suggested that at least one of these debrief sessions was bugged and monitored in real time by police.
In a well-documented sequence of events after admitting his role, Donaldson was later contacted on his home telephone by someone believed to be one of his handlers using the codename Lenny.
It has previously been said that other people were in the Donaldson household at the time and the informer told the caller he was unable to talk.
Sources say that during the short call, Donaldson was asked about his welfare and told that if he was in danger to go to the nearest police station and request a call be made to Castlereagh police station and to ask for Lenny.
Paid agent
As a paid agent, Donaldson received ‘a few hundred pound’ every month, it is suggested.
However, what are described as “incentive payments” were also made.
Sources say MI5 also controlled a bank account for Donaldson in which it is suggested there was £50,000 deposited at the time he was exposed.
Sources say that when Donaldson was told about the cash “his eyes lit up”.
He was also told by police that the money was there to be drawn down any time he made a request.
Despite claims that he was offered help and had access to cash, Donaldson eventually ended up in a family-owned cottage in Co Donegal.
During his time in the north-west gardai are said to have provided the PSNI with some information.
Police in the north are believed to have made their southern counterparts aware of threats against the informer.
Earlier this week, Donegal native Antoin Duffy (49) was charged with his murder at the Special Criminal Court in Dublin.
The 49-year-old appeared before the non-jury court after being extradited from Scotland where he had been serving a prison sentence for plotting to kill former UDA leader Jonny Adair.
Duffy is also charged with the attempted murder of Liam McGinley in Co Donegal in November, 2007.
Court reference to ‘Stormontgate’ may have blown Donaldson’s cover
Denis Donaldson was shot dead at a cottage in Co Donegal, left, in April 2006
Sources suggest the speed at which Donaldson was turned raised immediate suspicions in some quarters, with his recruitment being viewed almost like a “walk in”.
It has now been suggested some police officers formed the view that Donaldson was a ‘double-double agent’.
A double-double agent would mean Donaldson was sent by the republican movement to offer himself as an informer, so that the IRA could gather information about how Special Branch worked.
At the time of his arrest and recruitment, Donaldson was highly regarded in the republican movement and later held positions of influence.
St Matthew’s Church battle
From the Short Strand area of east Belfast, he is believed to have joined the IRA in the mid-1960s and is said to have taken part in the ‘Battle of St Matthew’s’ in defence of the Catholic church after it was attacked by loyalists in 1970.
A former republican prisoner, he was famously photographed in 1975 inside Long Kesh prison with his arm draped around the shoulders of Bobby Sands, who went on to die in the 1981 hunger strike.
A prominent figure across Ireland, he was a link man for the republican movement during the Drumcree parades dispute in Portadown and was regularly seen on the Garvaghy Road during the tension filled years of the mid-1990s.
Sources have previously suggested Donaldson represented the IRA’s ‘general headquarters’ and was involved in discussions to defend the nationalist area if authorities forced through a controversial Orange Order parade in 1998.
He was also a key figure in Sinn Féin.
Sources say one of his roles was to act as a conduit between rural districts and the party’s Belfast-based leadership.
He was a regular visitor to outlying constituencies as Sinn Féin attempted to build a base in the years after the 1998 Good Friday Agreement was signed.
US visit and Noraid suspecions
In the late 1980s, he was sent by republican leadership to the US and was later accused of trying to undermine the prisoner support group, Irish Northern Aid (Noraid).
At the time, a prominent Noraid official, Martin Galvin, raised concerns with republicans in Ireland about Donaldson but these were dismissed.
Donaldson was eventually thrust into the public spotlight in 2002 when an alleged IRA spy-ring was exposed at Stormont.
At the time of his arrest, he described himself as a “Sinn Féin Group Administrator in Parliament Buildings”/ the fledgling administration.
A prosecution involving Donaldson and two other men, William Mackessy and his son-in law, Ciaran Kearney, was dropped in December 2005.
Within days, Donaldson was outed as an informer, although some believe there may have been a second agent involved in the murky ‘Stormontgate’ affair whose identity has yet to be publicly revealed.
The exact role played by Donaldson during his years as a state asset has come under fresh scrutiny two decades after his death.
It is understood that despite agreeing to work with Special Branch, Donaldson rarely contacted police, and they normally had to contact him.
Strategic rather than operational intelligence
It is believed that, despite being well placed within the republican movement, Donaldson provided mostly “strategic information” about Sinn Féin and that intelligence relating to the IRA was ‘low grade’.
Some of those with knowledge of the case took the view that Donaldson may have been a republican plant, tasked with gathering information about how Special Branch worked, how they handled assets and general operating procedures.
Sources say that despite these suspicions, Donaldson saw first-hand some of the techniques used by intelligence agencies.
It is believed that during meetings he was routinely put into cars before being transferred to other vehicles and at times made to lie down in the boot.
These measures were deployed from both a security perspective and to have a “psychological” impact on Donaldson.
The informer was managed by a team of detectives and was usually met by several “highly trained” Special Branch officers.
It is suggested the “highest level” of operating procedures were engaged at every meeting involving Donaldson because he was so well known and had a public profile.
Caution was also taken to ensure the informer was not provided with any information that may have been useful to him or others.
THE Irish News understands Donaldson met his handlers in the days before the Stormont spy-ring controversy exploded more than 20 years ago.
MI5’s role
Although recruited by Special Branch, MI5 was also involved in running him at an early stage.
Despite their initial involvement, the agency later withdrew from meeting him.
It is understood that decision was taken after the organisation received “highly classified intelligence” confirming that Donaldson had been a ‘double double agent’.
Although the spy body believed Donaldson was of limited value, they still wanted the police to keep him on their books, it is suggested.
Sources with knowledge of Donaldson’s time as an informer suspect the well-placed asset was also answering directly to a senior figure in the republican movement.
While in the US, Donaldson befriended a man suspected by police of being involved in a break-in at Special Branch headquarters in Castlereagh in March 2002.
Zaitschek connection
Larry Zaitschek moved to Ireland where he worked as a chef at Castlereagh.
The audacious break-in operation resulted in the IRA securing a large amount of Special Branch material, some of which related to police informers.
A prosecution against the US citizen, who denied any involvement in the plot, later collapsed after the PSNI said they could not disclose all relevant material and conceded he would not receive a fair trial.
While mystery has surrounded how Donaldson was recruited for two decades, a question mark has also hung over how he was eventually exposed.
It is now being suggested that an
inadvertent reference during a court hearing linked to ‘Stormontgate’ may have been the catalyst for blowing his cover.
Sources say that as part of the spy-ring legal process, a Public Interest Immunity (PII) procedure was undertaken and hearings held.
PII certificates are issued when authorities do not want information to enter the public domain.
During one closed court hearing, Denis Donaldson’s name was mentioned as being an informer, sources say.
It is claimed this information was circulated by several people, including a police officer before being passed on to a journalist.
The PSNI’s duty of care
This, in turn, triggered an ‘alert’ during which senior PSNI officers are said to have discussed their ‘duty of care’ to Donaldson.
A then prominent police officer was tasked with making contact with Donaldson to tell him he was about to be named by the media.
Police later learned their high-profile asset had gone to Sinn Féin and provided the party with an account of his activities.
In the days after being outed, Donaldson was debriefed by members of the republican movement.
It is suggested that at least one of these debrief sessions was bugged and monitored in real time by police.
In a well-documented sequence of events after admitting his role, Donaldson was later contacted on his home telephone by someone believed to be one of his handlers using the codename Lenny.
It has previously been said that other people were in the Donaldson household at the time and the informer told the caller he was unable to talk.
Sources say that during the short call, Donaldson was asked about his welfare and told that if he was in danger to go to the nearest police station and request a call be made to Castlereagh police station and to ask for Lenny.
Payments
As a paid agent, Donaldson received ‘a few hundred pound’ every month, it is suggested.
However, what are described as “incentive payments” were also made.
Sources say MI5 also controlled a bank account for Donaldson in which it is suggested there was £50,000 deposited at the time he was exposed.
Sources say that when Donaldson was told about the cash “his eyes lit up”.
He was also told by police that the money was there to be drawn down any time he made a request.
Despite claims that he was offered help and had access to cash, Donaldson eventually ended up in a family-owned cottage in Co Donegal.
During his time in the north-west gardai are said to have provided the PSNI with some information.
Police in the north are believed to have made their southern counterparts aware of threats against the informer.
Earlier this week, Donegal native Antoin Duffy (49) was charged with his murder at the Special Criminal Court in Dublin.
The 49-year-old appeared before the non-jury court after being extradited from Scotland where he had been serving a prison sentence for plotting to kill former UDA leader Jonny Adair.
Duffy is also charged with the attempted murder of Liam McGinley in Co Donegal in November, 2007.
‘Like Geraldine Finucane and Bridie Brown, my mammy has a right to know the truth’
Jane Donaldson writes for The Irish News on the 20th anniversary of her father’s murder
WHILE April 4 marks my daddy’s 20th anniversary, the conspiracy to expose and murder him started four months earlier.
Police delivered a threat notice (PM1) to his home saying: “members of the media believe Denis Donaldson is an informer”.
That set in motion a chain of events. The source from which this threat originated has never been verified. Not a shred of evidence that my daddy was about to be exposed has ever been shown to my family.
Credible investigative journalists like Brian Rowan have also poured scorn on the claim. Most significantly, a file sent to the Public Prosecution Service (PPS) purporting to define the origin of the threat was found by the PPS to be contradicted by PSNI’s own records.
From the outset, my family has questioned the role of my daddy’s Special Branch handler, “Lenny”, and his Supervising Officer at that time. Both retired from the PSNI after I made a complaint about them to the Police Ombudsman. Each then went into a lucrative security consultancy, both here and abroad. Neither has been held to account.
What happened next still remains to be explained.
Publicly disavowed
My daddy was driven from Belfast to Dublin to read a pre-scripted statement in front of Charlie Bird, a former RTÉ journalist. In a nearby hotel, Sinn Féin held a news conference to publicly disavow my daddy.
He continued to be debriefed by them and was then abandoned. With nowhere left to run, he and my mammy sheltered in Donegal.
Sunday World journalist Hugh Jordan has repeatedly claimed he never identified my daddy’s location, but evidence available to my family, and to An Garda Siochana, appears to contradict his claim. By February 2006, Jordan published a story about my daddy being in Donegal. A month later, Jordan made a covert audio and video recording of my daddy, which was published by the media. Fifteen days later, my daddy was murdered.
In the days preceding the murder of my daddy, the PSNI shared intelligence with An Garda Siochána of a heightened threat to his life. For the last four years, my family has been trying to hold Gardai accountable through the Garda Ombudsman (Fiosrú) for what they did with that information before daddy was murdered.
Fiosrú are taking court action to compel Gardai to cooperate with their accountability inquiry into my complaint.
Already, a 15-year-long investigation by the Police Ombudsman in the north has found there was a “corporate failure” by the PSNI to safeguard the Article 2 ECHR right to life of my daddy and family members.
An Garda Siochána have accepted that their current investigation is “limited”. One example is the statement which I gave to Gardai in 2012 about the role of “Lenny”.
That has never been actioned by the DPP and my solicitor is trying to find out why.
Gardai still withhold my daddy’s journal, which they concede is of no evidential value to their murder investigation. With one person arrested now facing criminal proceedings, we shall follow that court case closely.
But it is not our primary concern.
There was a criminal conspiracy to expose and murder my daddy which crossed both jurisdictions on this island.
It is in the public interest to know not only who pulled the trigger, but also who pulled the strings.
Just like Geraldine Finucane and Bridie Brown, my mammy’s husband was murdered. She has a right to know the whole truth.
‘He was no stakeknife.’
Whatever the rights and wrongs of what my daddy did, he was no Stakeknife. Daddy owned up. Stakeknife didn’t.
But the differences didn’t end there. While Stakeknife was bunkered in west Belfast, daddy was driven to Dublin. While Stakeknife had a news conference arranged to deny his agent status, the world’s media were assembled for Sinn Féin’s leadership to denounce my daddy before he read a pre-scripted statement.
Republican meetings heard briefings that Stakeknife was not an agent, while other meetings instructed former comrades of my daddy not to attend his funeral.
While Stakeknife was shepherded to a safe haven, my daddy was thrown to the wolves. If there was a republican honour code or Special Branch handbook which handlers on either side of the Stakeknife scandal were following, how did they apply that to my daddy?
In recent months, I have met with the taoiseach, minister for justice, and the PSNI chief constable. All of them accept that my daddy’s murder was Troubles-related. But the current NI Troubles Bill disqualifies my daddy’s case because it happened after the Good Friday Agreement.
That is why my family is seeking an independent statutory inquiry with powers to compel information on a cross-border basis. We need the truth.
New IRA admits responsibility for proxy bomb targeting delivery man and police
BRETT CAMPBELL, Belfast Telegraph, April 4th, 2026
The New IRA has admitted responsibility for a proxy bomb attack on a Co Armagh police base.
A pizza delivery driver was forced at gunpoint to transport the viable device to Lurgan PSNI station on Tuesday night.
It sparked a major security alert, with roads closed and homes evacuated.
The driver was hijacked by two masked men in the nearby Kilwilkie estate before being ordered to drive to the station. In a statement to the Irish News, the New IRA used a recognised codeword and described itself as the 'IRA' while admitting responsibility.
It is not the first time people providing services to the PSNI have been targeted by dissidents.
Massereene Barracks
In 2009, two pizza delivery drivers were shot and injured by the Real IRA during an attack on Massereene Army Barracks in Antrim in which two soldiers were killed.
The New IRA includes some ex-Real IRA members.
During the Troubles, the Provisional IRA also targeted people working for the police. In 1992 eight Protestant workmen were murdered at Teebane crossroads near Cookstown. The workmen were targeted because their employer did construction work for the security forces.
SDLP Policing Board member Colin McGrath urged the New IRA to “leave the stage”. “There can be no justification for forcing a delivery driver to carry an explosive device to a police station, putting lives at risk,” he said.
“Nobody should be subjected to this while trying to do their job and this incident evokes some of the worst memories of our past. This group has no support and nothing to offer people in the North.
“We are constantly reminded of the futility of this kind of violence and I would ask these people to get off the backs of their community, leave the stage and let people live in peace.”
Police previously described the Lurgan device as “crude but viable”.
It was placed in the boot of the driver's white Audi A4 before being transported to the police station.
It is understood the car was driven past an empty security post and open gate and parked behind a blast wall before Army bomb squad experts carried out a controlled explosion.
Homes evacuated
Around 100 homes were evacuated during the incident.
On Thursday, Chief Constable Jon Boutcher condemned those who carried out the attack as “cowards” and said dissident republican groups “have no support and nothing to offer”.
Mr Boutcher said the incident is “likely to have been a sad attempt to appear relevant ahead of planned dissident republican parades over Easter”.
He said the investigation into the attack is ongoing but “there is little doubt that dissident republicans were responsible”. “The only thing these people are interested in is themselves and their own egos,” he said. “They are irrelevant to today's communities in Northern Ireland.”
Mr Boutcher described the attempted attack as being “as futile as it was cruel”.
“PSNI officers and staff are still the primary target of that threat.”
In March 2009, two soldiers were murdered as they accepted a pizza delivery at Massereene Army base.
Sappers Mark Quinsey (23) from Birmingham and Patrick Azimkar (21) from London were gunned down in what then Northern Ireland Secretary Shaun Woodward described as an “attempt at mass murder”.
Dozens of shots were fired and four others, including two pizza delivery men, were injured during the Real IRA attack.
Dissidents' claim on Lurgan attack has horrifying echoes of Massereene atrocity
ALLISON MORRIS, Belfast Telegraph, April 4th, 2026
As republicans across the island of Ireland prepare to commemorate the anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising, a dissident group was claiming responsibility for a bomb attack on Lurgan police station.
The New IRA said they had hijacked a delivery driver at gunpoint on Monday and forced him to drive a proxy bomb to the station where he raised the alarm.
The bomb was made safe by ammunition technical officers (ATOs) who carried out a controlled explosion on the “crude but viable” device.
The incident sparked a major security alert during which around 100 homes were evacuated.
In a statement to the Irish News, the New IRA used a recognised codeword and described itself as the 'IRA' while admitting responsibility.
It's worth noting that the only people who call the New IRA 'the IRA' are the New IRA, as they attempt to resurrect the ghosts of the past in order to justify their existence in the present.
When formed in 2012, the group was made up of people known in republican circles as having “clout”, people who had bomb-making capability and access to weapons and explosives.
Among them are the remnants of the Real IRA. Following the Omagh attack that killed 29 people, including a woman pregnant with twins, when a car bomb exploded in the market town, many members walked away from that group.
What was left joined with republicans from East Tyrone who had access to weapons, held back from decommissioning or acquired through European smuggling routes.
Also part of the merger was Republican Action Against Drugs, a vigilante group based in Derry who had been kneecapping alleged drug dealers. Those who went on to form the New IRA previously carried out the 2009 attack on Massereene Army base. Two soldiers were killed and two pizza delivery men were seriously injured in that attack, executed by masked men armed with automatic rifles.
Sappers Mark Quinsey from Birmingham and Patrick Azimkar from London died and the delivery men were seriously injured.
Colin Duffy and Brian Shivers were charged in connection with the attack. Duffy was acquitted, Shivers' conviction was overturned on appeal and Marion Price was convicted of providing phones used to claim the attack.
The claim stated that civilian pizza delivery men were legitimate targets as they were “collaborating with the British by servicing them”. Seventeen years later and the statement on the Lurgan attack used similar language in relation to the delivery driver.
It claimed he was targeted because they deliver pizzas to Lurgan PSNI station. But that is where the contrast between the two attacks ends. Massereene threatened the very fabric of the peace process. There were fears of loyalist retaliation and a potential end to the ceasefires.
There have been no such fears after Monday's attack, given the depletion of the capabilities of the main armed dissident organisations over the years. This weekend will see thousands join in the Easter commemorations, statements will be read and no doubt references made to Monday's attack. Militant republicanism has always existed, and violence comes in cycles and should never be written off in terms of intent.
But it is clear that the New IRA is now struggling for relevance in a much changed political landscape.
Dissident republicans are split over armed attacks
ALLAN PRESTON, Irish News, April 4th, 2026
SENIOR dissident republicans are increasingly distancing themselves from the type of armed attack recently seen in Lurgan, an expert has said.
Dr Marisa McGlinchey, from Coventry University, whose book Unfinished Business examines dissident Irish Republicans, has interviewed multiple influential figures on their views.
She believes the attack on March 30 – in which a delivery driver was forced to bring an improvised bomb to Lurgan Police Station – was unsurprising on Easter week, but did not have popular support within the dissident movement.
“I’ve been writing about this for a while and I’ve been pointing out that the organisations do go quiet for a while, but they’re still there,” she said.
“They’re still organised and capable and have a will to continue with these armed actions. Sometimes people forget that.”
She agreed with PSNI Chief Constable Jon Boutcher’s assessment earlier this year that the terrorism threat level in Northern Ireland could be reduced from substantial to moderate.
Notably, 2024/25 was the first financial year since 1969 when a security related death did not take place in Northern Ireland.
“I think it is true, we’ve seen a diminished capacity with the organisation. So we’re basically talking about the New IRA and the Continuity IRA, with the CIRA being particularly strong in Lurgan.
“But I think the key point is that even if the activity is so low, they do want to strike every so often to show they’re still there and capable.”
Family ties
While the secretive nature of the groups made it difficult to know who was still joining, she said :”Family ties remain very important though, with those social networks.
“Another thing is that people are still drawn towards them because they simply believe in a united Ireland and don’t believe in what Sinn Féin is doing or in Stormont.
“It’s important to point that out because it’s easy just to highlight the crime elements.”
While the lack of support for armed action among the general population is clear, she said it was “striking” that even senior figures within the dissident base were speaking out.
“People hear the word dissident and they just think violence, when in actual fact there’s significant figures within that dissident base who are saying ‘no, now’s not the right time for armed action.’
“Some of the people I’ve interviewed … (are) questioning armed action.
In west Belfast, a Saoradh mural features the image of Hooded Man Kevin Hannaway who died last year.
When asked if he still supported an armed campaign, he had said: “I wouldn’t publicly condemn. I don’t think there is any future in it for Ireland or for them except prisons because I do believe that they’re infiltrated.
“I do believe that they are being abused and misused.”
Dr McGlinchey added: “So these are heavy hitters within that dissident base, and I think the thing these groups will not like is they are questioning them.
“This is what will matter more, because they don’t care about the mainstream side. They don’t care about what Sinn Féin or the mainstream say, but when it’s coming from within your own base and people they really revere, I think that’s really interesting.
“It makes it more difficult for them to dismiss them.”
‘The Church has an obligation to welcome the stranger’
DENZIL MCDANIEL interviews John McDowell, Anglican Archbishop of Armagh, Irish News, April 4th, 2026
From attending Mass and meeting the Pope to a career in business and connections to the theatre world, Archbishop John McDowell is far from the stereotype of a leader of the Anglican Church.
A FEW days after John McDowell was elected Church of Ireland Archbishop of Armagh and leader of the island’s Anglican community, the Covid pandemic forced the country into lockdown.
Much of his early tenure, therefore, was conducted online and there were numerous challenges; not least the restrictions on funerals when comforting the bereaved and the closure of church buildings.
But he took the leadership role in his stride, much as he has continued to do in the face of a changed 21st century society.
He has spoken out about racism and integrating people of different cultures here, and about how we treat all minorities.
He has led the way in cross-community relationships and speaks about victims telling him how they feel.
The archbishop talks about how religion is still important to many people here and how the Church remains relevant to civic society.
In six short years he’s led his own flock through the pandemic and the “joy of opening churches again”. Despite his senior position, he’s in close contact with the his grassroots.
A morning spent in his modest office in the shadow of Armagh’s St Patrick’s Cathedral re-affirms my previous experience of him as a quietly dignified and humble man of good humour; yet one who has a presence and is courageous.
According to Plato: “Wise men speak because they have something to say, fools because they have to say something.”
Since he was ordained 30 years ago this year, and particularly in his time as Primate, Archbishop McDowell’s style of leadership has shown the wisdom of knowing when to speak out.
Primacy of Civic Society
“The Church is part of civic society and one of the voices of civic society. It’s not that we ever expect to have the last word; those days, if we ever had them, are gone now. We have something to say, but it has to be argued on its merits.”
He has led from the front on a number of issues, in particular when calling out racism in Moygashel last year, when an effigy of migrants in a boat was put on a bonfire.
The organisers denied it was racist, but he says: “I just thought it had to be called out because that’s exactly what it was.”
He thought of a quote from the Book of Leviticus about the way the people of Israel ought to treat strangers, because they were strangers in the land of Egypt and were badly treated.
The archbishop decided to speak out bluntly, admitting surprise that nobody else had done so, and he adds: “The Church has an obligation to welcome the stranger. It’s an unequivocal obligation. They’re in our midst, whether they’re going to stay there, whether they’re deported or whether they go home.
“I think the matter of migration, how we treat strangers, is a touchstone for the Church in the 21st century. I think it’s a vocation that we have and it’ll tell people things about us, what our values really are, what we are,” he says.
In addition to asylum seekers arriving today, the archbishop has taken the lead on integrating people from different nationalities who have made their home here over the years.
“By and large they’re not people who sit on their hands. They have energy and they have ideas. They’re not coming to create a migration problem, they’re coming because they want to do well for their families and they work very hard to do that. So they have a great deal to bring.”
He introduced a service last month at St Anne’s Cathedral in Belfast to mark “Racial Justice Sunday” and set up a racial justice and inclusion group within the Church of Ireland.
Welcomed but not integrated
AIMED at people from other parts of the world involved in ministry at various levels, he says: “We did a little survey to hear what their experiences were coming from a different ethnic background. Their experience was perpetual welcome but no integration.
“So, you’re very welcome, but nobody said ‘How can we include you?’”
He adds: “I think we can advocate for people from all sorts of minority groups, such as disabled people or people who feel nervous about their rights over Article 2 of the Windsor Framework.”
The archbishop has also continued to foster good relationships between the two more traditional communities.
He met the late Pope Francis on a couple of occasions, including an hour-long audience, describing him as “very talkative” and “a very congenial, convivial sort of person”.
By contrast, when attending the enthronement of the new pontiff last year, he found Pope Leo XIV very quiet.
“He could be a very still kind of presence. He definitely had a presence, the impression was that he was listening to what was being said,” was Archbishop McDowell’s view, although he admits to being very cautious about commenting on the internal affairs of another tradition.
In his short time with him, he personally invited Pope Leo XIV to Ireland.
Cross community partnership
And while he’s met the two popes, all the while he continues to forge cross-community links alongside his Catholic counterpart, Archbishop Eamon Martin.
Archbishop McDowell admits there are occasions when he comes under fire for his ecumenism, usually in anonymous emails or letters, but he speaks about two elements of the positive nature of relationships between the denominations: theology and community.
He recalls his background growing up in east Belfast in a mixed community, which goes some way to explaining early influences in forming relationships across the divide.
“Our relationships with other people, our attitudes to people different from ourselves, are very often formed very, very early in our lives.”
McDowell’s formative years were in a Housing Trust estate, which was about 70 or 80 per cent Protestant, but there was considerable rapprochement with Catholic neighbours and while not a “non-sectarian idyll”, there was a lot of contact, friendships were formed and impressions were created.
“I always say that when you’re very young the wax is soft and the impressions go very deep. It’s very difficult to shift them.
“That works both ways. If you’re in a family which has strongly sectarian views then that’s going to go very deep too.
“That’s when friendships begin and it’s very difficult to dislike people you have had an affection for.”
Integrated housing more important than integrated education
He adds: “I have always thought that integrated housing was more important than integrated education because that is when the outlook is formed.”
He describes his Church of Ireland mother and father as “very open-handed kind of people with a wise view of life”, saying his mother was “extremely devout with a strong respect for the sacrament of the altar”.
THE young John McDowell’s closest friends were a Catholic family of 10 and he recalls attending Mass with them on a Saturday night, adding with a smile that “they had very good dances in the hall afterwards”.
The Mass was in the newly-built St Bernadette’s Church on the former Hillfoot Road, now the Knock dual carriageway, the first big post-Vatican II church – “a remarkable place” – and he remembers a community and Catholic family, saying “the only thing it evokes for me is very warm memories”.
The fact that the spiritual leader of the main Protestant denomination on the island of Ireland regularly attended Mass, in the early days Latin Mass, may come as a revelation to some, but it is only a part of his journey which adds to understanding of the theological differences and similarities between the two.
“The reason why the Church of Ireland communion service and the Catholic Mass are now very similar is because they both went back to original sources. There was a great movement in the 1960s, parish and people movement, and they had, in the years since the Reformation, discovered ancient liturgies.
“There was one called the Apostolic Constitutions of Hippolytus, a fourth century liturgy. Both the Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion went back and looked at those and revised their communion services,” he explains.
While there are many discussions going on at higher and deeper levels between the world churches, Archbishop McDowell concedes that there aren’t many people interested in theological discussion in their everyday lives.
“I have always been involved in ecumenical endeavour and dialogue. So you have theological dialogue which is one strand. But you then have just ordinary community and civic relationships, and they’re probably more important,” he says.
The two Irish Primates are based in the same city, and Archbishops McDowell and Martin get on well personally.
There’s strong symbolism in their public appearances together, such as on the streets of Armagh on St Patrick’s Day or presenting cheques to organisations of behalf of charities.
He agrees that there is a good relationship: “Yes; I mean we’re not living in each other’s pockets in a sense, but I think we can be pretty honest with each other.”
He also finds relationships between the communities good. “I think people get on all right by and large.”
Although born in Belfast and having served in other parts of Northern Ireland, the clergyman has spent two significant spells on the border, as Bishop of Clogher in Fermanagh and Monaghan and now in Armagh.
“There are particular places around the border where there are memories and it’s a miracle of grace that it’s even as good as it is when you hear some stories,” he says.
“The conversation that’s going on at the moment about acknowledgement (of its role in the Troubles) by the government of the Republic, I think is very significant to them. I think it would mean a lot to them.
Good intentions
“Even with the best of intentions, if the government of the Republic felt they weren’t part of the problem, they can still be part of the healing,” says the Archbishop.
“What I found was that people who were victims didn’t want to talk about it every day of the week. But nor did they want it distorted or completely obliterated as though it never happened.
“The vast majority of victims don’t belong to a victims group.
They’re just people who have had terrible experiences. They’ve worked out how to deal with it,” he says.
“The only time they get annoyed is when somebody misrepresents them.”
HE also believes that surveys prove Ireland north and south remains significantly religious and recalls the challenges the Church faced during the pandemic.
There were discussions between Church representatives and civic authorities, but the Archbishop recalls: “There was probably no need for the harshness around a funeral. Six people to go to a funeral and to stand miles away. That was not a good decision.
“There were people within the Church who thought ‘This is going to be the end of us because we’re not allowed to come to church.’ What we discovered was that people realised that although they weren’t going to church but coming online, that the place needed to be sustained.”
So, they found ways of giving, and the Archbishop says: “I’ll never forget going round churches as they opened again and there was an unmistakeable, absolutely palpable sense of joy and relief to be back in the building.
“Those buildings turned out to be very important to them, and what went on in them. It turned out to be very important to people because it was where they experienced holiness in their life,” he says, and reveals that church attendance is now back to about 80 per cent of what it was pre-pandemic, including people who hadn’t been there before.
Aerospace and acting
Throughout all the challenges that a Primate faces, Archbishop McDowell brings personality and a wealth of life experience to the task of leading and unifying people.
He turned 70 this year and he celebrated with his identical twin brother who returned home from Australia for the occasion. The two are the youngest of four, with a brother 12 years their senior and a sister 10 years older.
His twin brother has spent a lifetime in the aerospace industry and was managing director of British Aerospace in Australia and is still chairman of the Australian Atomic Energy Authority.
John McDowell worked with Shorts for a number of years and was a director with the CBI before leaving to go to Trinity College in Dublin in his late thirties. He was ordained at the age of 40.
He met his future wife, Mary, at Queen’s. As Mary Jackson, she was a professional actress who appeared in the groundbreaking “Billy” plays with Kenneth Branagh and James Ellis.
“I’ve heard it all, the actress said to the Bishop,” he jokes.
Mrs McDowell still teaches drama part-time in Enniskillen and their daughter Dorothy read English at Oxford and is now working for the Society of London Theatres with the ambition of becoming a theatre director.
Archbishop McDowell briefly also worked in the arts theatre years ago, and got to know James Ellis well; at Ellis’s request, he gave the address at his funeral.
“I’ve always known theatre people,” says McDowell.
Through his early inter-faith experiences and since, high-powered career in business, his theatre connections and attending rugby internationals when time permits, John McDowell cannot be accused of being a senior churchman lacking experience of real life.
Immigrants
The Archbishop spoke out strongly when an anti-immigrant effigy appeared on a bonfire in Moygashel, Co Tyrone last summer
‘‘ I think the matter of migration, how we treat strangers, is a touchstone for the Church in the 21st century. I think it’s a vocation that we have and it’ll tell people things about us, what our values really are, what we are. By and large they’re not people who sit on their hands. They have energy and they have ideas. They’re not coming to create a migration problem, they’re coming because they want to do well for their families”, Archbishop John McDowell
'I live, eat and breathe the Shankill.
SUZANNE BREEN, Belfast Telegraph, April 4th, 2026
‘I never dreamed of leaving and I'm the only unionist who can win at the next Assembly election'
SUZANNE BREEN, Belfast Telegraph, April 4th, 2026
The family lived right on the west Belfast peace line. “Our home in Springmartin overlooked Springhill in Ballymurphy. The Army used it regularly as a vantage point to watch republicans when the Troubles began,” McCoubrey recalls.
“My brothers, sister and I would be lifted sleeping from our beds and taken to a safe house. When we returned, our home would be peppered with bullet holes from gun battles between the soldiers and the IRA.
“Other times, the house was hit when we were in it. I still get flashbacks. One of the most frightening experiences happened as we ate our tea on the sofa.
“A high velocity bullet smashed the window. It passed through the TV, causing it to explode. Thankfully, the bullet hit the wall — missing my father and me.”
In the summer of 1971, the McCoubreys were evacuated with other Springmartin families to Liverpool.
‘They called us Paddies’
“We hated it,” the DUP councillor says. “They called us Paddies. We came home after three weeks.
“Our house was in an absolute state. I remember my mother getting out of the black taxi and bursting into tears. There wasn't a window left. There were steel shutters over the house.
“She cried and cried. She had a breakdown after that. People might say we should have moved to another part of Belfast, but we had no money and nowhere else to go.”
McCoubrey attended Black Mountain Primary School. “It was a safe haven in the war zone in which we lived, and even that disappeared when I was in P2,” he explains.
“The Army took over the school. They built sangars and a helicopter landing pad in the playground. There'd be paratroopers standing with SLRs in the corridors.
“We were terrified. This was the environment where we lived, slept and now were educated. Nobody ever came and said, 'Are you OK? Do you need help?' There was no support. You were just expected to get on with it.
Joe Hendron
“I remember the SDLP's Dr Joe Hendron talking about the massive effect the Troubles were having on children. He was spot on.
“The kids on both sides — in Springmartin and Springhill — paid a very high price. However, imperfect politics may be now, we're in a far better place.”
The 59-year-old still lives in the house where he grew up. He raised his own children there. “I never dreamed of leaving this area,” he says.
For 30 years, he's been a local councillor. In May 2027, he hopes to become an MLA.
He has contested the West Belfast Assembly seat before — losing by 89 votes in 2016 — but believes boundary changes will make it a case of fourth time lucky. It's been almost two decades since unionists held a seat in the constituency.
“Shankill, Woodvale, Derriaghy and Dunmurry now fall entirely within the new boundaries,” he says. “Unionists secured a 17% vote in the 2024 Westminster election, which is an Assembly election quota.”
McCoubrey could be battling either Sinn Fein's fourth candidate or People Before Profit's Gerry Carroll for the last seat. However, his party believes that if the TUV runs — there has been speculation it could stand prominent councillor Ron McDowell — the vote could be “fatally” split.
Common sense
“I'm hoping common sense prevails and everyone gets behind me,” the DUP man says. “I'd like to see unionist unity. It's not about Ron or me, it's about winning a seat for unionism.”
The TUV's Ann McClure won 5% to McCoubrey's 11% in the Westminster election, suggesting that Jim Allister's party could make big inroads with a high-profile candidate. However, the DUP councillor argues that was “a protest vote” which will return to his party.
“We're taking nothing for granted. We've already begun knocking doors and we'll do so for the next 13 months,” he says. “I'm the only unionist who can win. I'm the only person who has put the work in. There's no part of the Shankill I've not helped or supported. Ron has known me for years. He knows how hard I work. I live, eat and breathe the Shankill. Despite difficult circumstances, I always hung in.”
When McCoubrey was 18, his father, Frankie — a fitter in Belfast Gasworks — tumbled to his death from a roof. “As the eldest of four, a lot of responsibility fell on my shoulders,” he recalls. “I'd just begun working as a painter and decorator.
“I took all the overtime available to help pay the bills. My mum was a guide on buses taking disabled kids to school. She got a second job in the Royal Victoria Hospital laundry. It was tough.”
McCoubrey's father was a former loyalist prisoner. “Like so many people in working-class areas here, he got caught up in things he shouldn't have,” the DUP councillor says. “After jail, my mother gave him an ultimatum. It was us or the other life, and he chose us.”
Branded bad people
McCoubrey claims his father's conviction was one reason why Belfast City Council denied his family compensation. “My dad was deemed a bad person because he'd been to prison,” the DUP man says. “We were treated terribly. It made me determined to be a thorn-in-the-side of the council establishment when I was elected.”
He'd joined the Ulster Democratic Party — the UDA's political wing — in 1993. “I'd left school with no qualifications,” he says. “I was a quiet DUP supporter, but I didn't think mainstream politics was for people like me. I was very political as a teenager. I'd the walls of the bedroom I shared with my brothers plastered with posters of Ian Paisley, Ulster Says No and whatever. My brothers went mad. They wanted posters of Ferraris and famous women, but I ruled the roost.”
Asked if he was a UDA member and if he condemns the paramilitary group's campaign, McCoubrey replies: “No, I wasn't in the UDA. Things happened that were wrong. The UDA was set up to protect the unionist community.
“It did things in the past that I couldn't agree with. All atrocities were wrong. They shouldn't have happened. Too many people are in their graves. Too many were carried down this road and other roads in coffins. It was a horrible time. I never want to see the like of it again.”
After joining the UDP, McCoubrey opened an office in Highfield. “The UUP was the biggest local party. We saw them as the fur coat brigade,” he says.
“I worked on housing and community issues. There were more homes blocked up in Springmartin than there were ones with families living in them. We deserved better.”
McCoubrey stood in the 1997 council election. “I was shocked when I was elected. I remember standing outside City Hall. A cavalcade of cars approached with horns blaring,” he recalls.
“The Shinners always had cavalcades. I thought it was them until I saw the Union Jacks being waved from the cars. I climbed in, and there was a massive cheer when we arrived on the Shankill.”
‘I changed a lot’
McCoubrey was “completely overwhelmed” in his early council days. “I was the youngest in the chamber and the sole UDP member. I went in as a super-Prod determined to fly the flag high. I changed a lot,” he says.
“I arrived early for my first committee meeting, and saw two well-known politicians — a unionist and a Shinner — come in together.
“They were talking about their weekend, their families, everything but politics. I thought they'd be going at each other hammer and tongs, but they were laughing and joking. They knew how to work together for a better Belfast.”
Sinn Fein councillors Fra McCann and Tom Hartley were friendly to McCoubrey. “I was very wary and suspicious of them at the start,” he says. “They told me to put out press releases every time I secured something for my community.
“A UUP councillor said that was nonsense, and to leave it until the last six months before an election. He was wrong, and the Shinners were right.
“I fundamentally disagreed with their politics, but the Shinners fought tooth and nail in the council for their community, and I was determined to do the same for mine.”
McCoubrey built a strong relationship with then DUP councillors Nigel and Diane Dodds and Sammy Wilson. One party representative was already known to him.
“Nelson McCausland had taught me at Cairnmartin Secondary School,” he explains. “I was a terror at school — they were delighted to get rid of me — and he'd been very strict.
UDA and Adair
“On the day I was elected, I walked into the members' room. Nelson was reading the paper and didn't see me. I put my hand on his shoulder and asked, 'How are you doing, Sir?' He turned around and said, 'Oh no, McCoubrey! You didn't get elected, did you?'”
McCoubrey's term of office as deputy mayor in 2000 was marred when he shared a platform with UDA members Johnny Adair and Michael Stone at a loyalist culture day on the Shankill, which ended with masked men firing shots in the air.
“I was there to read a speech welcoming people to the Shankill. I'd not been on stage had I known what was coming. It happened very quickly. It's something that will haunt me for the rest of my career. It's a big regret. I'd turn back the clock if I could, but I hope I've made it up to all those I let down.”
McCoubrey joined the DUP in 2012. He describes himself as “liberal” on social issues.
“I believe in live and let live. I don't judge anybody,” he says. “There are different views in all political parties. Members of my family are gay. There's no room on the Shankill for judging people.”
He has three children from his first marriage, and two sons — Frank and Kyle — from his second, which also broke up. He raised them as a single parent. “For a long time, I was embarrassed to tell people that I was a single dad,” he says.
“I thought there was a stigma to it. I knew plenty of single mothers, but no single fathers, so I kept it to myself.”
McCoubrey admits that having been “a traditional male”, it was a steep learning curve to “now do it all on my own — the washing, getting the kids ready for school, taking them to the doctors and dentists, cooking every meal. Thankfully, they're plain Janes when it comes to dinner, so I get away with spag bol or fish and chips.”
He's no longer “ashamed” of his parental status. “I'm very proud of it, now,” he says. “At times, it wasn't easy. Like me, they were typical wee boys — not great at school. Frank is 22 now, and Kyle is 19. They're both working. Frank's in engineering and Kyle's in ventilation. They're my best friends.”
McCoubrey refused an opportunity to become Lord Mayor in 2016, because his sons were too young, but he took up the role in 2020. “We were three months into the pandemic. Only seven people were allowed into the chamber to see me being elected,” he explains.
Impact of Covid
“There was no handing over of the chain of office. I'd to pick it up myself. The next day in City Hall, there was only a security man and me. There was no installation dinner. We used the budget for that to buy hampers for care homes, hospices, hospitals and schools.
“At Christmas, the Lord Mayor traditionally visited Clifton House with gifts for the elderly residents. I couldn't go inside. One wee woman put her hand up on the window. All I could do was raise mine on the outside to meet hers.
“People say you 'You had a terrible year', but I'd a brilliant year. I saw the best of Belfast and its people.”
McCoubrey recalls one lighter moment after Covid restrictions eased. “Visiting St George's Market, I spotted two ladies from the Shankill,” he says.
“Our natural greeting would have been a big hug, but I knew I had to keep my distance. Some people would have loved a picture of me breaking the rules.
“The women called out 'Frank! Frank!' as they came running in my direction, ready to throw their arms around me. 'Don't touch me!' I shouted. They shot me a look of 'Who do you think you are?' I had to explain later. I'm far from perfect, but nobody could ever accuse me of having airs and graces.”
NI is most vulnerable region in UK as Energy crisis looms thanks to Stormont
SAM MCBRIDE, Northern Ireland Editor, Belfast Telegraph, April 4th, 2026
NI DUMPING QUARTER OF ALL GREEN ENERGY BECAUSE STORMONT HAS BUNGLED, YET IT IS STUBBORNLY REFUSING TO FACE REALITY OF ITS ACTIONS
We are now more than a month into what is likely to be a protracted energy crisis which has the potential to be especially brutal for Northern Ireland.
The Financial Times yesterday reported that UK motorists face £2 a litre diesel prices within days.
Such drastic hikes in energy prices will force up the cost of nearly everything because few products don't involve energy in their production or transportation.
It could be much worse. We remain one of the world's rich nations, and while paying vastly more for energy is unwelcome, for most of us it is possible.
My colleague Abdullah Sabri spent last week in Kenya, where he met people on the breadline — and there that word involves deadly literalism.
As we buy oil and gas at hugely inflated prices, the poorest nations won't be able to afford those prices, triggering human misery and further geopolitical instability.
Yet even here, if oil and gas remain dramatically above what we've come to expect, we'll all be poorer — and many people will face real hardship.
Already crude oil is almost double the price it was at the start of the year; natural gas prices in Europe have more than doubled in the same period.
The cause is a war no European nation started, nor can end.
We are vulnerable to the whims of a US President who freewheelingly articulates contradictory reasons and objectives for his war almost every time he opens his mouth.
There was a time when Northern Ireland would have been better placed than other parts of the UK to face such a crisis. We once had one of the world's highest levels of deployed renewable electricity.
We also still had a coal-fired power plant until a couple of years ago.
It was filthy, harmful to human health and starting to fall apart after a long life, but meant some diversification of supply; now all our non-renewable energy is produced by gas.
Alongside that, renewable electricity has gone into decline — while Stormont's Economy Minister, who is responsible for electricity policy, improbably claims we can reach a looming target now wildly out of reach.
Setting Green energy standards impossible to meet
Stormont did here what it does best: It passed a law setting the most extreme green electricity target in the UK and Ireland, but then did nothing which would realistically mean we might meet that target.
The MLAs who voted for it (DUP and TUV voted against) felt good about themselves and were able to tell green lobbyists that they'd done their bit.
Yet arguably the target actually made things worse. A realistic target might have put pressure on the political, civil service and regulatory system to strain every sinew in being able to say they'd succeeded.
Instead, the target was so improbable that it appears to have fostered the attitude: We're never going to hit that anyway, so does it matter if we miss it by a little or a lot?
The reasons for Stormont's initial success incentivising renewable energy were baser than they first seem.
Our devolved administration isn't exactly a hotbed of fervent environmentalism, as a glance in Lough Neagh's putrid direction confirms.
Yet, oddly, Stormont once presided over a policy which meant it was at the forefront of green electricity.
Six years ago the Northern Ireland Audit Office published an investigation into the Northern Ireland Renewables Obligation (NIRO), a vast green electricity subsidy with which Arlene Foster was intimately involved while minister in what is now the Department for the Economy (DfE).
After reading the auditors' findings, I found it far harder to believe that the infamous Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) was a mistake rather than part of a wider policy of extracting as much from London as possible — something senior DUP figures and top civil servants have at various points appeared to both confirm and deny.
As with RHI, the NIRO was overwhelmingly not funded by Northern Ireland. Auditors calculated that of the potential £5 billion bill for the 20-year scheme, three-quarters will come from GB electricity bill payers.
As with RHI, Foster — while being advised by her longstanding Spad Andrew Crawford, and her department's energy division — took decisions which made the scheme more generous, a curious decision when her party had been critical of green energy subsidies.
Generating tariffs instead of energy
As with RHI, these decisions created perverse incentives. Claimants were incentivised to deliberately alter wind turbines to cut their output so they would qualify for the most lucrative tariff which was quadruple that on offer for the largest and most efficient turbines.
That meant poor value for money for consumers — but with most of those consumers residing in GB, it meant a bonanza of 'free money' flowing into Northern Ireland.
There were other parallels: Moy Park was a major beneficiary, and when London made clear it wouldn't be paying, Stormont walked away from supporting the policy.
When it did, Northern Ireland went from having the UK's most generous green subsidies to now being the only part of the UK without a subsidy for renewable heat or electricity.
Yet for a long time this has been poorly understood.
When in 2022 Alliance MLA Stewart Dickson tabled an amendment to the Climate Change Bill which introduced a legal target to have 80% of all electricity generated from renewable sources by 2030, he told the Assembly: “The move to 80% will not be that difficult…this is very much low-hanging fruit.”
The intent here was noble but it involved a failure to comprehend the key reason for the surge in green electricity. Many people appear to have looked at the sharply-rising graph and thought it could credibly keep soaring.
Yet once London stopped shipping cash across the Irish Sea for this purpose, that would require herculean pain by a Stormont which detests even thinking about pain. It would mean subsidising green energy through a Stormont-imposed tax.
This could be a literal tax (such as through the rates system) or more likely a de facto tax by putting a charge on every electricity bill.
It's one thing selling green energy as a way to suck lots more money from Great Britain; it's a very different thing to tell your constituents they should be billed for it.
Our devolved administration is so far off the pace in energy policy that it raises questions as to why this area was ever devolved.
A fortnight ago Utility Regulator John French appeared before the Assembly's Economy Committee.
A system quietly rotting
French, an unusually straight-talking official who appears to be trying to reform a system which for years was quietly rotting, told MLAs Northern Ireland's energy legislation hasn't been updated since 2003 — unlike the Republic and Great Britain.
That is extraordinary, given the scale of technological changes over the last two decades.
Brian Mulhern, a senior official in the regulator's office, set out the scale of the challenge to meet the 80% green electricity target.
He said it started with the need for a better grid “which can carry renewable electrons from one part to the other…there's no point building loads of extra wind [turbines] if it can't be utilised”.
He said that about one in four of the renewable electrons currently being generated in Northern Ireland is not making its way to people's homes as electricity. We are effectively dumping a quarter of green electricity because we can't handle it.
He said there would also need to be more battery storage, something which requires strategic thinking, a joined up planning system and political coherence.
When asked about the 80% target, he euphemistically described it as “a very challenging target that's been set”.
When pressed by the committee's DUP chair, Phillip Brett, as to whether it was achievable, he appeared to accept it wasn't, saying “but can you move the dial towards 2030 — there are certain things you can do”.
When French was asked, he was starker, saying simply: “It's difficult to see how it can be met.”
Brett said DfE had “refused to accept the unrealistic nature of the targets but the Utility Regulator at least gave an honest and realistic assessment of the trajectory and the likelihood that the target would be met”.
Looking at the data, the target is now clearly preposterous.
Falling renewable energy sources
By 2023, the rolling 12-month average (which smooths peaks and troughs) showed that 51% of all electricity was coming from renewable sources. It's since fallen to 47%.
Yet despite being in reverse, DfE insists we can somehow leap ahead in the next three-and-a-half years.
DfE says it recently changed how the data is collected so we can't compare data from this year with anything which went before.
Whatever the reason for that, it's convenient for a department which knows its target is now fanciful.
Yet it accepts that the key figures in the new data are only modestly different to that which went before.
The main difference isn't in total renewable energy production but in the sources of that energy.
The new data, for instance, says renewable electricity peaked at 50%; the old data said it peaked at 51%. We therefore can be pretty clear as to the scale of the problem.
When Economy Minister Caoimhe Archibald published the Mid-Term Review of the Northern Ireland Executive's Energy Strategy in December, I asked her if she believed that the 80% renewable electricity target by 2030 is still achievable.
She replied in a statement: “Yes, my department remains fully committed to achieving the target of 80% electricity consumption from renewable sources by 2030.
“This is a statutory requirement under the Climate Change Act. Achieving this goal requires a collective effort, involving strong collaboration across government, industry, and other stakeholders.”
This is delusional. To achieve the goal would require crisis management of the sort we saw during the pandemic. Yet there isn't the slightest sense of panic from her department.
Two days ago Archibald was on far more comfortable territory: Telling the British Government what it should do in energy policy.
She demanded Sir Keir Starmer cut fuel duty “as a matter of urgency”.
There is a good chance this will happen, but for Starmer's own political reasons, not because a Sinn Fein minister demanded it.
Our Executive has been very good at telling others what they should do, and very bad at doing itself what it knows it should do.
We can't control UK Government policy. But we've been given control of our own energy policy. What's the point of having that control if we don't use it to improve people's lives?
Even if you don't care about the environment in the slightest (and plenty in Stormont don't), even if you don't believe carbon emissions are altering the climate (and some in Stormont don't), there is a simple and compelling logic for dramatically increasing renewable energy.
Aside from any environmental benefits, it enables us to have far more economic control than when oil and gas have to be shipped from notoriously unstable parts of the world.
On top of that, it means the billions we ship out in return for the ships which bring hydrocarbons in could be invested closer to home.
Rise in low energy creation jobs
There are now more than 7,000 people in Northern Ireland employed in low carbon energy. As recently as 2021, that was just 4,300.
In the short term, this means subsidies to establish what is a new industry. But in time, this will taper off.
Already some forms of green energy are at or close to not requiring subsidy.
There would be additional benefits, such as for the health service — and for ourselves — as the reduced pollution leads to decreased sickness.
Northern Ireland consistently spends a higher proportion of household weekly income on energy than any of the other three UK regions (the Republic's prices are even higher, but earnings are significantly higher).
That means we're going to feel pain to a greater extent than any of our neighbours.
Energy policy often requires years of work before we see the results.
Stormont didn't cause this war or this energy crisis, but by its decades of failures it will make it worse for the people of Northern Ireland.
Blaming the Brits for that might suit those looking an easy scapegoat but it's as inaccurate as it is uninventive.
