A former adviser to Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness has been paid compensation after losing his job as a result of a new law banning anyone with a serious offence holding such a post.
Paul Kavanagh, husband of Sinn Fein Derry MEP Martina Anderson, stopped receiving payment from the Office of the First and Deputy First Minister (OFMDFM) earlier this month.
Mr Kavanagh, originally from Belfast, was sentenced to five life terms for his role in an IRA bombing campaign that included the killing of an army explosives expert and a 1981 attack on Chelsea military barracks in London.
The 57-yearold was released from jail following the 1998 Good Friday Agreement and four years ago he was chosen by Sinn Féin to be a Special Adviser in the joint of Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister.
He lost his Stormont job because of a bill drafted by Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) leader Jim Allister, The Special Advisers Bill emerged in 2011 when Sinn Féin Culture Minister Carál Ní Chuilín chose an adviser jailed over the killing of 22-year-old teacher Mary Traverss.
Mr Kavanagh had claimed the Bill victimised former prisoners, especially members of Sinn Fein.
He said: “Twenty years into a peace process and the victimisation goes on and we’re still going to exclude people? Exclusion was part of the problem that we had and why we ended up in conflict. Is the message out there, that’s what we’re going back to, exclusion?
“I worked in the community and voluntary sector for seven years before coming to the Assembly, working with some of the most deprived communities, trying to help build a better society.
“Ex-prisoners are saying to me `why are we being victimised’?”
Mr Kavanagh said the Bill made a mockery of the law, given the fact his wife, a former republican prisoner and one-time Junior Minister at Stormont, would not be able to take up an advisory role.
He said: “My wife was a minister and could make decisions, but under this law she couldn’t be employed to advise people making the same government decisions.”
The amount Mr Kavanagh is to be paid in compensation has so far remained undisclosed.
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