British collusion Northern Ireland: UUP's Tom Elliott asks if IRA victims will get to question a former Taoiseach on Dublin-IRA collusion after Sinn Fein MP John Finucane quizzes Sir John Major in a public hearing

Former UUP leader Tom Elliott was speaking after Sinn Fein MP John Finucane quizzed Sir John Major for almost 20 minutes in Dublin on Thursday at the Joint Committee on the Implementation of the Good Friday Agreement.

During the meeting, Mr Finucane outlined to Sir John reports which he said found evidence of British collusion. In response Sir John said that collusion was not a government policy and not something he had ever been aware of.

In 2012 then Prime Minister David Cameron apologised to John Finucane's family and agreed that there had been state collusion with loyalists in the murder of his father Pat in 1989.

But Mr Elliott found the sight of Mr Finucane quizzing Sir John on such matters inequitable in the wider legacy context.

“The sight of a Westminster MP for a Belfast constituency using a Dublin committee to question a former British Prime Minister will have caught the attention of those victims in Northern Ireland who have been seeking answers from Dublin for decades," the MLA said.

“One wonders when the victims of the hundreds of cross-border attacks that emanated from the Republic will be given a similar opportunity to question former Taoiseach’s about the death and destruction caused by the IRA as it rampaged along the border for decades using arms imported into the Republic and hidden on its territory?

"The Smithwick Tribunal barely scratched the surface with regard to [collusion in] the murders of senior RUC officers Breen and Buchanan, but was so embarrassing for Dublin that nothing of its ilk has been seen since. "

During the hearing Sir John himself pointed out emphatically that southern politicians also had close links to terrorists. He said he deplored collusion, but added: "Now there was a great deal - on both sides of the border north and south, of discussion between some politicians, not Westminster politicians, but Irish politicians north and in the south, with the paramilitary bodies. I think that is certainly beyond doubt."

He offered to make enquiries with British intelligence about this, but added that it would probably be of little value now.

Mr Elliott added that terrorists "were responsible for 90 per cent of Troubles related deaths" of the Troubles.

He added: “During the Troubles there were an estimated 35,000 shootings, 15,000 bombings, 40,000 injured victims and 3,200 deaths. Focussing on a few high profile cases distracts from the bigger picture and the horrendous human rights abuses perpetrated by the terrorist gangs who caused them.”

Mr Elliott also said the Irish government had questions to answer about Irish ministers helping arm and create the IRA in the 1970s.

A Sinn Féin spokesperson hit back at Mr Elliott – but did not acknowledge the issue of Dublin collusion with the IRA, as evidenced by the Smithwick Enquiry.

"It is a matter of public record that British state forces were involved in the murders of Irish citizens, including massacres in Ballymurphy, Derry, Springhill and the New Lodge,” Sinn Fein said.

"Collusion between British State Forces and loyalist death squads has also been established in a number of reports by the Police Ombudsman and by Britain's most senior police officer John Stevens.

"These paramilitary gangs were responsible for hundreds of killings, bombings and shootings. State services assisted these death squads in acquiring intelligence, money and arms, and members of state forces were directly involved in the assassinations of Irish civilians."