Sinn FΘin should campaign vigorously for a proper policing service required by the Belfast Agreement, Mr Gerry Kelly told the Ard Fheis.
Mr Kelly, Ard Chomhairle, spoke on an emergency motion on policing calling for Sinn FΘin to continue to campaign for a genuine new beginning to policing and to oversee a process of engagement with the Sinn FΘin membership. It also called on Sinn FΘin and the community to discuss the current situation in respect of policing and to explain the party position.
Mr Kelly said nationalists and republicans in the six counties had suffered under the hands of the RUC for generations. The RUC was and had been the paramilitary arm of unionism.
In the negotiations surrounding the Agreement the demand for a new, accountable and representative policy service was key. They then had the Patten recommendations. Sinn FΘin took the position that if the Patten Report was implemented in full there may be a basis for a new policing service and that in these circumstances they would not be found wanting.
Mr Kelly said the party had spelt out publicly and in detail where the Act and the current British proposals fell short.
It was regrettable that in these circumstances the SDLP and the Irish Government had chosen to support the British Government position on policing, he said.
"Their support of the British position and the SDLP decision to take seats on the Policing Board has effectively sundered the broad consensus that had emerged on this issue. It is in my view a mistake of mammoth proportion," Mr Kelly told delegates.
The British Government was not an honest broker. All power to give effect to amending legislation to achieve what was agreed rested with it. "For these reasons, Sinn FΘin was not nominated to the Policing Board. Sinn FΘin is calling on young people not to join the police force," he said.
"We should leave this Ard Fheis today as activists ready to campaign vigorously against recruitment to this present paramilitary police force and ready to campaign for the proper policing service," he concluded.
One of the delegates, Mr Barry McElduff, Co Tyrone, said in spite of everything the RUC remained and big questions had to be asked about the RUC's continuing involvement in the community.
"God help Irish nationalists. We should be unequivocal about the RUC," he said. The RUC remained discredited but nationalists still had to wait for a police service which was accepted by all the community, he said.
Delegates voted in favour of the emergency motion which also called on the British Government to implement the measures necessary to generate an effective and expeditious process to achieve the new beginning to policing required by the Agreement.