Hi °C | Lo °C Security expert Brian Rowan asks what will become of the UDA in the next phase of peace process
You can see the sense in the plan - in this deadline that would be a last chance for the paramilitaries, and in the current context for the loyalists.
The Assistant Chief Constable Peter Sheridan doesn't want to step onto political ground. He's making that clear.
His argument is purely a policing one.
That crime should be called what it is - and no longer dressed up as paramilitary activity.
The criminals shouldn't have that cover.
That's why the senior police officer wants this "cut off" date, and if the UDA or any other organisation continues with the type of activities he has described, then they should be labelled "criminal gangs".
Peter Sheridan is giving the paramilitary "brigadiers" something more to think about.
The Independent Monitoring Commission will report in October and again next April, and if I'm reading their signals correctly, there is no mood to " prolong" that monitoring role.
People are starting to think about the next phase of the peace process and what is required - and what is no longer needed.
"Nobody else has an IMC," one source commented.
Nobody else has an Independent International Commission on Decommissioning (IICD) either.
The loyalists - the main organisations the UDA and the UVF - have not decommissioned any of their weapons.
And the UDA has been linked to those recent gun attacks on the police in Carrickfergus and Bangor.
But what will happen in the new situation - the next phase of the peace process - that some are now turning their minds to.
What if there is no IMC and no IICD? What if the paramilitaries are just criminals? What if their guns are found?
A source who spoke to this newspaper, gave a very clear answer: "Once you close down the IMC and the IICD, any weapons found (will be) open to forensic tests."
The amnesty, the arrangements of the decommissioning process, that the loyalists haven't taken advantage of, will be gone.
This is the new world that may not be that far away.
The UDA, more than any other organisation, is under a political and security spotlight.
It has put itself there and is being watched because of the continuing power struggle within the organisation, and watched because of its involvement in what happened in Carrickfergus and Bangor.
All of this makes a nonsense of the suggestion that the organisation is in a serious conflict transformation process, and all of this emphasises the importance of decommissioning.
Look at how quickly the UDA, or factions within it, were able to find their guns and fire them.
In relation to another of the loyalist organisations, there is a different, better assessment.
My understanding is that the IMC sees some change in the profile of the UVF.
That changing profile has to do with reduced activity since its endgame statement was delivered on May 3.
"An effort is being made, and it would be a pity if they spoiled it all by not being able to deliver on weapons," a source told the Belfast Telegraph.
There is a thinking that is moving towards Peter Sheridan's plan - and the deadline and a last window of opportunity.
"There has to be a cut off, and thereafter they (the paramilitaries) are organised crime gangs."
That's the new position the Assistant Chief Constable is arguing for.
Will the politicians - the Government - see the logic and the worth in that policing suggestion?
