Paramilitaries 'won't be paid to disband', says Benn

Northern Ireland Secretary Hilary Benn has insisted paramilitaries will not be paid by the government to "disband".

But he defended the government's decision to explore the possibility of formal engagement with paramilitary groups.

In a joint move, London and Dublin are to appoint an independent expert to assess whether there is merit in beginning a process which could bring about the disbandment of paramilitary groups.

It followed a recommendation from the Independent Reporting Commission (IRC) which was set up to monitor paramilitary activity.

But the move has been heavily criticised by Justice Minister Naomi Long who said it was "flawed" and would only serve to give paramilitaries "legitimacy in some communities".

TUV leader Jim Allister also criticised the plan in the House of Commons on Wednesday describing the independent expert as the "nursemaid for paramilitaries".

He claimed such groups had "taken successive governments for a ride" over talk of transitioning and "pocketed millions along the way".

"When is this pandering going to come to an end?" he asked.

SDLP leader Claire Hanna also questioned the move and warned against a "pay day for paramilitaries".

But Benn ruled out any potential payoff for paramilitary groups.

He told MPs: "There is no question of paying anybody any money to disband."

He also defended the decision to appoint an independent expert to carry out a "scoping exercise" to find out if it was worth having a formal engagement process.

"The fact is that 26 years after paramilitaries should have left the stage they are still here and are still causing harm to communities," he said.

"The proposal from the IRC is to go and inquire are there some who do want to leave the stage and if there is merits in having a process."

Justice Minister Naomi Long said that formal engagement has been tried before and "has not worked".

Speaking on the BBC's Talkback programme, the Alliance leader said the situation now is "a number of organised groups who have transitioned themselves into organised crime".

"Our response has to take account of that," she said.

She added that the suggestion that the government might enter formal engagement with these groups would "give them a form of legitimacy that they would not offer for example to a burglar, to a drug dealer, to an extortionist, to a racketeer, to a fraudster".

Mitchell Reiss, a former US Special Envoy to Northern Ireland and a commissioner on the panel of the IRC, said that paramilitarism has "proved more persistent and pernicious" than people imagined at the time of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement.

Describing paramilitarism as a "blight on certain communities", he said that it has continued to impact economic growth and a "sense of a shared community" in Northern Ireland.

He said that "transition has not worked in its current configuration".

Reiss said that the direct engagement would enable an "[assessment] of these group's willingness to disband", adding that it would be a "scoping exercise".

He said the IRC's hope was that this process of engagement "will come back with a recommendation to the governments as to whether or not they want to set up a formal negotiating process that can move these people off the pitch".

"It's more complicated than them just going away, as wonderful as that would be."

Reiss said the IRC has been "consistently clear that we're not talking about paying people to go away".

SDLP leader Claire Hanna said there was a sense among the public that "we have soft soaped these guys for years".

She said that what "most people see" from paramilitaries is "the racism [and] the sectarianism".

"We cannot legitimatise and elevate and pretend that these are conquering armies that we have to help reintegrate into society," she said.

Ulster Unionist Party MLA Doug Beattie said that paramilitaries "shouldn't exist".

However, he said that the people in these groups are "people who want to do something positive for their community", people who are "inactive" and "those who want to line their pockets with money and criminality".

"The reality then... is there has to be different ways of dealing with these groups."

Beatie said that the government's approach should involve "policing and justice" alongside "community transition".

BBC News NI has contacted Sinn Féin to ask them for a comment.