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Northern Ireland (St Andrews Agreement) Bill

Only one party has been absolutely clear: the UK Unionist party of Bob McCartney. He has made it absolutely crystal clear that he is opposed to this entire project—always was and always will be. I am under no illusions about the process. There is still work to be done. No one can be forced into government, and no one will be forced into government. If at any stage between now and 26 March—this repeats the point that I was making earlier—we run out of track, devolution becomes dissolution: the clock is stopped, the election scrapped. That is the reality. In that event, direct rule and plan B, with even closer co-operation with the Irish Government, will stretch into the foreseeable future. The Governments will not be chasing after the parties. We will have done as much as we humanly can. It would be for the parties to come to the Governments to tell us when they would be ready to do the deal that would restore devolution. I leave it to Members to state how likely they believe a deal would be done by the parties on their own when they could not accept the deal facilitated by the Government.