The article by the British ambassador to Ireland, Sir Ivor Roberts, is the latest instalment of an unseemly strategy of sell and spin now being pursued by the British government over the Police Bill.
The approach is short-sighted. It distracts from addressing the continuing concerns about the content of the Police Bill. It plays badly in Ireland and America. It really would help to heal relationships if this thoughtless folly was to stop.
In his article, the ambassador criticises an article by Prof Brendan O'Leary as "selective", "one-eyed" and "full of froth". This is ironic. For what could be more "selective" than the Secretary of State writing to members of the US Congress, quoting Seamus Mallon MP and Eddie McGrady MP where they have welcomed improvements made to the Bill, but omitting their criticisms of other parts of it?
What could be more "one-eyed" than the Secretary of State's misleading justification for the retention of the RUC in the formal name of the police - that Patten himself wanted that link between the RUC and the new police service? In fact, Patten stated that the link should be established through the retention of the colour of the present police uniform - something the SDLP has never questioned.
The ambassador's comments are also "full of froth" since they do not address the points raised by Prof O'Leary or do so inadequately. For example, the ambassador addresses none of Prof O'Leary's criticisms that the Police Bill undermines the arrangements for accountability envisaged by Patten by:
failing to give the Oversight Commissioner his proper role in validating the process of police reform;
failing to give the Police Ombudsman the power to investigate police policies and practices;
allowing the Secretary of State to block Policing Board inquiries because they would be "repetitious" or would "serve no useful purpose";
allowing the Secretary of State to ensure the efficiency of the police - a role that should belong to the Policing Board;
preventing the Policing Board looking at anything that occurred in the past, even when relevant to an inquiry arising in the future.
However, it would add little to comment further on the ambassador's article. Better to ask the British government why it is that their Police Bill and management of key issues have given rise to such reaction and rancour among the nationalist leadership and community? The Secretary of State maintains that this is because the SDLP, for example, is "in negotiations" over policing and wishes "to maximise" its position. Such an analysis is a facile dismissal of real difficulties.
These criticisms are not made merely because there is a divergence from Patten. They are more deeply rooted. They are informed by past experience of policing in Northern Ireland. The RUC has never been held properly to account operationally, legally or financially. This cannot be allowed to continue. The powers of the new Policing Board, Oversight Commissioner and Police Ombudsman cannot be constrained in the manner the Bill proposes.
Experience of the past also informs the criticism that the Bill does not oblige the police to have regard to international policing standards. The treatment of detainees, the use of force and the protection of lawyers have been issues around which our conflict has revolved. For the police to have regard to UN codes on these issues would help avoid repeating past abuses.
The headlines, however, have not been generated by the shortcomings of the Bill regarding accountability and human rights. Rather, it is the failure to implement unambiguously Patten's recommendations on cultural matters that has caused such public controversy. In the heat of the debate, some appear to have lost sight of an essential purpose of Patten. To take politics out of policing. To create a police service with which everybody can identify.
The reality is that the flying of the union flag and the name "Royal Ulster Constabulary" are heavily politicised. And they are not matters with which everybody in Northern Ireland identifies. The failure to implement Patten's recommendations on these matters - and the management of them in the House of Commons - does not inspire confidence in the commitment of the British government to depoliticise policing and to create a police service operating with the consent of all in the community.
The Police Bill has become ensnared in the perceived need to consolidate pro-agreement unionism. However, there is a wider context. It is one grounded in the Good Friday agreement. It is the Patten report. The British government should appreciate that for nationalists to sign on to the Good Friday agreement, without agreement on policing, was an act of faith. For nationalists to sign up to Patten, with reservations, was an act of leadership. For nationalists to participate in a new police service is a cultural and community watershed with few precedents. This is the extent of the risks for progress that nationalists have undertaken and are prepared to take again, if the government gets policing right.
Regrettably, the British government has not yet done so. But the opportunity can still be reclaimed. To do so, the governments must ensure Patten is the essential touchstone against which to judge policing change. There must be a process in the coming weeks that comprehensively legislates for policing change in the Bill and conclusively implements policing change in practice.
The ambassador ends his article with throwaway lines in response to Prof O'Leary's thoughtful probing. Just as slogans about policing ill-served the past, spin over the Police Bill ill-serves the future. Better we consider the words of the late US Senator Robert Kennedy who once said, "the work of our hands, matched by reason and principle, will determine our destiny." Patten represents the reason and the principle. All hands will be needed to secure our destiny.
Alex Attwood MLA is the SDLP spokesperson on policing.