Debate contribution: Ramming of Police Vehicles: South Armagh
Debate contribution by Mr Cathal Boylan on .
- MLA
- Mr Cathal Boylan
- Party at the time
- Sinn Féin
- Date
- 22 April 2024
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Private Members' Business
- Heading
- Ramming of Police Vehicles: South Armagh
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 4484647
Read the official Assembly record
Text
Thank you. The BBC report from December 2023, which cites a 50% increase in injuries to officers because of their vehicles being deliberately rammed, states that the crashes happened mostly in north and west Belfast, Derry and border areas such as south Armagh. The figure of 77 is for the number of officers injured across the North. The PSNI highlighted in the media that there was an increase in deliberate collisions with PSNI vehicles across the North in 2023. There were 45 in total, compared with 34 in the previous year. Police figures for that year show that there were more ramming incidents in Belfast City than in Newry, Mourne and Down. The figures also show that the increase was greater in Belfast City and in Derry and Strabane than in Newry, Mourne and Down. Indeed, the increase was significantly higher in Derry and Strabane than in Newry, Mourne and Down. Media reports also show that ramming of police vehicles took place in England and Wales in the same period. It is not something that only happens here or in one area. On the other hand, having police cars rather than police jeeps in an area can help to support confidence in policing, improve trust and make people feel that they can alert police to activity in the area that they are concerned about. No matter where they occur, such deliberate collisions with police vehicles are to be condemned. Even one such attack is one too many. Ramming incidents harm officers who are trying to provide a local policing service and, in another way, harm the local community who are deprived of that service. We wish all the police officers injured in those attacks well. The ramming of police vehicles in the hope of evading arrest must stop. The south Armagh review had considerable benefits for policing in the area. Police are out and about in the local community, as they are in other areas. They are welcome in our schools, our shops and our GAA clubs.
Police, themselves, report that the review has brought a new approach and style that maximises visibility and engagement with people in the local area whilst seeking to increase the safety of officers going about their daily work. Police cannot properly engage with the community if they cannot be seen. They cannot properly know what is happening in an area if they do not engage. Policing Board members visited south Armagh in November 2022 to see how things were going. The local police officers spoke very positively about the south Armagh review and the benefits that it had brought to policing in the area. On crime trends, police highlighted their success, in December 2023, in seizing suspected cocaine with an estimated street value of £10 million, when police from the Slieve Gullion neighbourhood policing team stopped a suspicious lorry near Jonesborough. That was the largest seizure of suspected cocaine ever made by the PSNI. Securing policing by consent is not something that can be done in one year and then forgotten about the next. It is always a work in progress and is always worth doing. I urge Members to support our amendment.
529 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not qualifying”.
- Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.08 (qualifying needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not qualifying).
- None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
- Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.83).
- No identity-based framing was identified (0.95).
- Subject area: Sport (including the GAA), the arts and cultural bodies.
- The overall probability was at or below the not-qualifying threshold.
This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.
Jev’s structured answers
| Question | Probability | Met? |
|---|---|---|
| Identity framing | 0.06 | No |
| Sectarian or communal antagonism | 0.03 | No |
| Cultural grievance politics | 0.02 | No |
| Dog-whistle messaging | 0.05 | No |
| Controversy escalation | 0.06 | No |
| Legitimate policy scrutiny | 0.83 | Yes |
| Overall judgement | 0.08 | At or below not-qualifying threshold |
| Option | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-based framing (chosen) | 0.95 |
| Reports or questions it | 0.00 |
| Criticises or condemns it | 0.05 |
| Adopts it | 0.00 |
| Subject | Probability |
|---|---|
| Sport (including the GAA), the arts and cultural bodies | 0.45 |
| No identity-related subject | 0.37 |
| Legacy of the Troubles, victims and paramilitarism | 0.15 |
| Sectarianism, hate crime and community relations | 0.03 |
| Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials | 0.00 |
Assessed 21 October 2026 at 10:01 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.
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