The IRSP have reacted angrily to comments made in a statement by Alliance Party spokeswoman Eileen Bell, accusing her and her party of using smoke and mirrors to deflect attention from the urgent need for an inquiry into Mental Health resources in the North and the decision process that lead to one of the dead being denied an acute bed in a local hospital even though he told staff he would take his own life if refused.

"'Pathetic and unconvincing,' I think was the phrase she used," IRSP spokesman Terry Harkin said today. "I'll tell you what I find pathetic and unconvincing, the fact that there are 13 and very possibly 16 deaths across North Belfast and it takes the most tenuous of links to an armed group in just two of the cases to make this an issue of media interest."

"Why is this? There seems to be a certain amount of hand washing, buck passing and diverting from the real issues going on. There are 13 dead in 6 weeks, that is a fact, the INLA seem to have acted against two of these following pressure from the local community over antisocial issues. What about the other 11? Are their deaths not worthy of note? Do those deaths not point to a serious social problem in the North of the city? Who was responsible for the decisions to send young O'Neill home when he was plainly ill and in need of care? And, when they sent him away was there any after care planed, was there a care plan, a CPA meeting? What did the toxicology reports on all 13 say, what was the role-if any-of drink and recreational drugs in all this? Most importantly, why, when it is a statistical proven fact and well known in the NHS that suicide is a cluster phenomena were precautions not being taken and support being offered to the friends and family of the deceased and just why is it Ms Bell and her party not asking these questions?"

"These are questions that need answering," Mr Harkin said, "but don't hold your breath, these are partly funding issues and the Alliance among others had a chance to provide those funds when they administered the Whitehall budget for the North through the Assembly. They had the chance to press the British to implement change in the as yet un reformed and overtly sectarian paramilitary police force. Can Ms Bell and her colleges really believe that members of the public in these communities would go to the armed groups if they had access to an acceptable policing service? They need to grow up and live in the real world with the rest of us, a world where a suicidal young man can be sent home to die because there's no bed and exasperated communities are forced to turn to armed revolutionaries instead of the police for protection."

"This whole thing about the INLA is a diversion, smoke and mirrors to divert attention from appalling lack of services or planning on the part of the local Health Trust, the neglect into which the NHS has fallen in the North having been raped for years to pay for tax cuts for middle England. And then we have the fact that Ms Bell has a colleague well placed to help with this issue, is the brother of a certain Lord not only a party member but also a consulting psychiatrist at the hospital that sent the O'Neill boy home to die? These and the immediate provisions of funds to set up community mental health services and provide more acute beds are the real issues. But sure nobody's worried about that because it was all the fault of the Irps and every thing else in the garden's, while not quite rosy, good.

"The only people in this to play a straight hand of all the pro- agreement parties is Sinn Fein. Fra McCann has worked for years to expose the underlying trends of suicide in the North and Gerry Kelly by his comments proved that at least one of the pro-agreement parties know what needs to be done if Stormont is ever revived. Until that time maybe Ms Bell and her party could spend their time trying to press the British for more money for services and the reforms needed to make policing acceptable to the indigenous population of the island."

STATEMENTS ENDS