REACTION:BILLY WRIGHT'S father David criticised the inquiry team's "narrow interpretation of collusion" and rejected its central finding.
“It looks like collusion, it sounds like collusion and in my mind amounts to firm and final proof of collusion by state agencies in acts and omissions culminating in Billy Wright’s death,” he said.
“It is appalling in a democratic society that a finding has now been made that the [failure to share intelligence] by the RUC of various threats against Billy Wright between 1996 and 1997 constituted dreadful acts of omission that facilitated his death.”
Northern Secretary Owen Paterson said the prisoner, who was in the care of the state, should not have been murdered and said he was “sincerely sorry” it had not been prevented.
“Whatever horrendous crimes Billy Wright or the LVF committed, his murder in a high-security prison should never have happened,” he added.
Former Northern secretary Shaun Woodward said the absence of an explanation about how weapons were smuggled into the Maze was “extremely serious”.
Given Mr Paterson’s declaration that no more open-ended public inquiries will be held, Mr Woodward asked if this meant that an inquiry into the killing into Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane is now being ruled out. Replying, Mr Paterson said he has still to meet the Finucane family.
Democratic Unionist MPs openly questioned the verdict of the five-year inquiry. Ian Paisley jnr said the report’s findings were “convenient conclusions” for the British government. He said the £30 million report was therefore a “whitewash”.
His colleague Jeffrey Donaldson said: “We cannot allow this report to pass without further inquiry into how those weapons came to be in the possession of the INLA terrorists. His father is entitled to the truth of what happened to his son and I do not believe that the report gives us that.”
SDLP MP Mark Durkan said he had shared David Wright’s “pain as a father” but he had also met with many of the victims of his son and the LVF.
A series of further “wrongful acts”, “serious failures” and a host of practices in the Maze were highlighted by the inquiry for contributing towards Mr Wright’s death: “Yet all that adds up to no collusion: what does it add up [to]?” he asked.
Sinn Féin’s John O’Dowd alleged the LVF, like other loyalist groupings in north Belfast, were “controlled, directed and manipulated by the British state”.
“It will come as no surprise that the report places much of the blame at the feet of the prison administration. We would strongly support the recommendation contained in the report for a complete overhaul of the administration of the prison system in the North.”
Sir Robin Masefield, the current director-general of the NI Prison Service said: “This dispels a cloud that has unfairly hung over the Service since the allegation was first made.” He added: “I would point out that the NI Prison Service had previously, as long ago as 2002, accepted negligence in civil proceedings. But it is important to note that the report, after its exhaustive proceedings, makes no finding that any failing by any manager or member of staff was intentional.”