Alex Maskey: “I find it truly disrespectful that he decided to make the announcement at a public session…”
I didn’t see any immediate reaction from Sinn Féin to the Chief Constable’s announcement on Thursday that 150 officers would be redeployed to guard police stations in light of the increased threat from republican paramilitary groups. But Matt Baggott’s reported comments at Saturday’s UUP conference – that the reductions in police numbers from 13,000 to 7,000 was done too quickly – appear to have struck a nerve. The BBC reports that Sinn Féin MLA, and Northern Ireland Policing Board member, Alex Maskey, “has disagreed with the chief constable’s assessment …