THE Sinn Fein president yesterday dismissed the Northern Ireland Police Authority's consultation document as lacking both trust and credibility.
Speaking during his canvass in the Donegal North East constituency, Mr Gerry Adams said the authority could not be trusted and pointed to the recent dismissal of two of its members, including the former chairman, Mr David Cook, as evidence of what he claimed happened to anyone who suggested that there should be some small changes in the way the RUC was run.
"I don't give the report any credence. Everybody knows that the RUC are unacceptable to nationalists and that has to be the starting point. There has to be a policing service, not a police force, which is under democratic control.
My experience is that people in nationalist and republican areas want police. They are law abiding people.
"It's a miracle indeed that the fabric of those small communities has remained intact after 25 years of civil unrest, and the fact that there hasn't even been a proper discussion of policing shows you the moral cowardice of Patrick Mayhew and others who would preach to us about democracy."
Mr Adams said his party's proposed joint SDLP Sinn Fein boycott of May's elections in the North was an issue that affected the entire nationalist community.