The head of policing in Northern Ireland has been urged to consider his position over the mass breach of officers’ data amid warnings that terrorists could use the information to carry out attacks.
Sammy Wilson, a Democratic Unionist party MP, suggested Simon Byrne’s future as chief constable might not be sustainable.
There were calls from Labour for a full investigation into the “chilling” disclosure of officers’ details, including their surnames, initials, locations and departments – as well as further information about the rank and grades of civilian staff.
Byrne has cut short a family holiday to face questions at an emergency meeting of the Northern Ireland policing board on Thursday.
Wilson said serious questions had to be asked at the highest level of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) about how the details were released as part of a freedom of information disclosure, said to have been accessible for up to three hours.
He told Sky News: “Right up to the chief constable level, questions have to be asked about how come the police in Northern Ireland do not have a process which ensures that information such as this is checked, rechecked, filtered out before it ever gets made public.
“That’s not the job of some lowly police officer or administrative officer within the PSNI. That’s a job which should be carried out and responsibility held for by senior police officers, right up to the head of police, because of course he will be the one who sets the policy.”
Wilson added: “I think the chief constable has to ask himself: ‘What role do I play in all of this and is my position sustainable?’”
As well as the PSNI’s erroneous publication of officers’ details, Byrne is also likely to be questioned at Thursday’s meeting about the revelation that a cache of documents, a police-issue laptop and radio were stolen from a car in Newtownabbey in July.
Police in the region are under threat from terrorists, with the current assessed level at severe, meaning an attack is highly likely.
Earlier this year, Byrne said he received briefings almost every day about plots to attack and kill his officers, adding that the ongoing threat from dissident republicans remained a “real worry”.
In February, a senior detective, John Caldwell, was seriously injured when he was shot by gunmen at a sports complex in County Tyrone.
Fears about officers’ safety in the aftermath of the latest breach were raised by Andrew George, a chief inspector in the PSNI and president of the National Black Police Federation.
Writing in the Guardian, he said that “the potential consequences of a breach like this are too dire to contemplate, but here we are, having to do just that”, adding: “Most officers are concerned with ensuring their families are safe, and since the breach, I have heard of officers moving to a relative’s house as a precaution.
“I don’t know anyone personally who has yet made the decision to leave the force, but I have no doubt it will have an impact on officers making that decision. It will certainly slow down the number of those coming into it in the next recruitment process.”
George said since the breach, he could “sense the anxiety from my colleagues”, who already checked underneath their car every morning and took their weapon home for protection due to the threat of being attacked on and off duty.
Mike Nesbitt, a policing board member, said PSNI officers from a Catholic or nationalist background were stunned and angry.
“I’m very concerned and, more importantly, I think the police family are very concerned,” the Ulster Unionist party MLA told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. “They’re stunned, they’re angry, they’re even questioning the future.”
He said he had heard most from officers from a Catholic or nationalist background, some of whom had kept their job a secret even from family members.
“They’re saying: ‘We’re making sacrifices, we knew the risks, but we don’t deserve this to have our personal information in the public domain and we don’t know where that ends up.’”
The shadow financial secretary to the Treasury, James Murray, called for a full investigation and said the impact on officers’ lives was “really chilling”.
Byrne has signalled he does not intend to quit. Asked whether he was planning to do so, he told the Financial Times: “No, I am not.”
The Northern Ireland secretary, Chris Heaton-Harris, said the breach was a “very serious matter”, and spoke to Byrne on Wednesday.
