POWERS HELD by the Police Service of Northern to search people at random until they were ruled illegal by the European Court of Justice last year are to be overhauled by Northern Ireland Secretary of State Owen Paterson.
In 2009, the PSNI stopped 10,000 people for searches – up 300 per cent on the year before – as efforts to tackle dissident republicans intensified, but it led to complaints in some nationalist districts of harassment.
Police officers who do not have grounds for reasonable suspicion that a person is carrying weaponry will not now be allowed to carry out a search without prior authorisation from a senior officer.
Mr Paterson is also to create a new power for PSNI officers that will allow them search for suspicious items if they have grounds for suspicion, he said in a written ministerial statement lodged in the House of Commons yesterday.
The changes will bring legislation North and South closer in line, because gardaí do have the right to carry out searches if they suspect people of offences, but not to do so randomly.
Northern Ireland Office minister of state Hugo Swire told the Commons search powers “are essential in Northern Ireland for tackling the threat from terrorism”. A code of practice will be worked out between the policing board and PSNI Chief Constable Matt Baggott.
Chair of the board’s human rights and professional standards committee Basil McCrea MLA said it will consider implications of the new legislation.
