Enniskillen man, Peter Sheridan, the former Assistant Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, addressed the annual conference of the Progressive Unionist Party (PUP) which took place at the weekend.
Ironically, Mr Sheridan was asked to deliver the annual Billy McCaughey Memorial Lecture, in honour of an ex-RUC officer, also a UVF member who was imprisoned for murder and who later embraced the peace process without repudiating his violent past.
Mr Sheridan, who was one of the most high-profile Catholic policemen in the force admitted: "When Dawn Purvis (leader of the PUP) asked me to speak at this conference, I could have taken the easy option and said 'no'.
"When she told me I would be giving the Billy McCaughey Memorial Lecture, my instinct may have been to say no. But, we can't always take the easy option and certainly peace is not made by taking the easy option and that is the main reason why I agreed."
Mr Sheridan left the PSNI earlier this year to become Chief Executive of Co-operation Ireland. He said he had heard stories that suggested that Billy McCaughey had changed and that, before his death, his outlook and contribution to society was progressive and forward-thinking.
Against this backdrop, Mr Sheridan said, it followed that Northern Ireland had to complete the path to change: "Society is still divided, and people have to realise this is costing everybody, in many different ways."
He noted that segregation of communities and individuals was costing £1 billion a year, and that it also had an impact on communities and discouraged economic growth.
Mr Sheridan said people here needed to realise that their fate was inter-dependent: "I passionately believe that Northern Ireland is a great place. But, unless we can change this (division), Northern Ireland cannot realise its full potential.
"I mean all of us working together for the greater good of the whole community - that is community activists, business leaders, politicians, teachers, all walks of Northern Ireland society must recognise the vital role they have to play."
And, issuing a challenge to those present - many from loyalist areas - he suggested that they 'truly have to embrace integration, if many of their communities are to survive'.
For example, Mr Sheridan noted the decades of decline which had occurred in the Shankill area of Belfast where, he said, a community which was sealed off, in social and religious terms, was dying, rather than thriving.
"If we continue to hunker down in our own communities, or if we continue to rely on government grants, then the future of our communities is questionable," he submitted.
"I would urge you to take risks for the good of the community, build those partnerships outside of your own community, think about how you move your community into some sort of economic self-development, and act on how you engage with other communities around you, the other side."
Mr Sheridan then told delegates: "Make no mistake: the other side will need to feel safe and secure to shop in the Shankill.
"There aren't enough people in it to sustain it and, the same goes for many other areas in Northern Ireland."
He said change was not about people losing or changing their cherished beliefs and identities, and in fact, very often it could be about protecting them.
