Tommy Roberts

This article is part of SpinWatch's Northern Ireland Portal.

Tommy Roberts was a journalist with the Belfast Telegraph and then from 1962 press adviser to the Unionist Government in Northern Ireland.

According to David Miller:

The Unionist Prime Minister Basil Brooke had created a Cabinet Publicity Committee in 1943 and the Information Service as a separate entity came into existence in 1955. But, it was not until the mid sixties that 'modern' ideas about marketing and image entered Northern Ireland politics under the impetus of Finance Minister Terence O'Neill. In 1962 Ex Belfast Telegraph journalist Tommy Roberts was appointed as Public Relations officer at the Ulster Office in London by O'Neill, in the face of Cabinet Office objections. His job was to remedy the 'bad industrial press' which O'Neill thought that Northern Ireland was getting. In 1963 O'Neill became Prime Minister and Roberts, while remaining based in London, operated informally as his press secretary on his almost annual visits to the US .

By July 1970, according to a document disclosed at the Bloody Sunday Inquiry, Roberts was Deputy Director of the Information Service at Stormont and met with two British military psyops practitioners visiting the North with a view to reccommeending that the British appoint psyops practitioners in Northern Ireland.

One of those visiting Belfast was INQ 1873 an anonymous witness at the Bloody Sunday Inquiry. He visited Northern Ireland on 15-17 July 1970 shortly after the Falls Curfew, while serving as GSO I (PSYOPS) JWE. He met with staff officers at HQNI, R Burroughs, the UK Government Representative in Northern Ireland, and Tom Roberts - Deputy Director of Information, Government Information Services.

In his report on the visit, INQ 1873 made the following recommendations:

a. The feasibility of setting a radio station on the lines of a Forces Broadcasting Station be examined.

b. The feasibility of establishing a committee for the co-ordination of psyops activities and for dissemination of

information be established.

c. A Psyops Staff Officer is placed on call to HQ Northern Ireland, and will visit HQNI periodically.

d. An examination is made on the effectiveness of current left wing propaganda activities.

e. PR should be more active and positive wherever possible.