An independent review should be carried out into the Police Service of Northern Ireland’s (PSNI’s) culture and recruitment of Catholic officers, the chair of the Catholic Police Guild has said.
Supt Gerry Murray said the number of Catholic applications for the PSNI’s latest recruitment drive is “disappointing”.
It comes after Chief Constable Jon Boutcher revealed that of the 3,500 applications made to the PSNI, 27% are from a Catholic background.
“We’re not where we need to be, but Rome wasn’t built in a day” Mr Boutcher said.
Supt Murray said there “is still a long way to go”.
“Policing for the Catholic community has never been in their DNA” he said.
“If you look at people who joined the police from a different background to myself, their fathers, their grandfathers have all come through the police so there is that natural family cohesiveness with people from a different community background.”
He added that policing has “never been inviting to people from the Catholic community”.
Spt Murray cited the PSNI data breach, in which the details of around 9,500 workers were mistakenly published in response to a Freedom of Information request, as another possible reason for the low number of applicants as safety concerns remain a “barrier to entry”.
“The data breach was a sharp reminder to us all of issues of safety.
“It might have gone off the headlines but it is still there,” he said.
He called for an independent, Baroness Casey-style review into the “culture and recruitment of police officers in Northern Ireland”.
Baroness Casey led a review into the culture and standards of the Metropolitan police which found widespread “discrimination” within the service.
Between 2001 and 2011 there was a 50-50 recruitment initiative, which meant there was one Catholic recruit for every one person from a Protestant or other background.
Since then, there has been no legislation to address the issue.
The new recruitment campaign is the first since 2021.
Applications are below the last two recruitment drives, which attracted 5,300 and 6,900 applicants respectively.
Mr Boutcher said the drop in applications was “mirroring” difficult recruitment campaigns by other forces, such as the Metropolitan Police.
