The British Prime Minister bluntly told the Northern Ireland parties last night that engagement and compromise were essential if the multi-party talks were to secure a political settlement.
Mr Tony Blair also hammered home the challenge spelt out earlier in the day by the British and Irish governments to the talks participants to begin negotiation on the detail of a settlement capable of commanding the support of their communities.
Dr Mo Mowlam, the Northern Secretary, said it was "daft" for the two governments to be negotiating as "proxies" for the political parties, which themselves had to have "ownership" of any agreement likely to prove durable.
The Prime Minister was speaking at a reception for the parties at Lancaster House last night after a fractious day which had seen the SDLP welcome a British-Irish discussion paper on future North-South links as "fully consistent" with the Joint Framework Documents, while the Ulster Unionists simultaneously dismissed the paper as "of no relevance".
The Sinn Fein president, Mr Gerry Adams, gave a cautious welcome to the reaffirmation of the two governments' commitment to their previously declared positions. However, he insisted the party wanted to "go much further than the Framework Document" and immediately asked the two governments to produce their agreed position on the issues raised in a series of questions to which the parties have been asked to respond.
But in some of the most trenchant language yet used, the Ulster Unionist leader, Mr David Trimble, denounced the Framework Documents as "a failure" and asserted that anyone thinking it offered the basis for an agreement "is not living in the real world, he is on the wrong planet". In a clearly planned piece of theatre Mr Trimble's colleague, Mr Jeffrey Donaldson MP, tore up the Framework Document - produced by the two governments in 1995 - declaring unionists would not put their hand to it. And when pressed as to how the UUP alone could dismiss a document endorsed by the two governments and other talks participants, Mr Trimble declared: "We're perfectly capable of saying No. After all it's going back to what we do best."
Members of the Progressive Unionist Party delegation were privately highly critical of the UUP attitude. And Mr Blair's comments last night were being seen as evidence of growing frustration and impatience on the part of both governments with the failure of the process to get down to the detail of a putative agreement, and the continuing refusal of the UUP to "engage" directly with Sinn Fein.
The parties will conclude this week's London session today with discussion on the North-South issue followed by a session devoted to the wider London-Dublin relationship. But nothing of substance on this front is expected before the parties present their written submissions to the next Strand 2 talks, scheduled for the week after next in Dublin. The process moves back to Stormont next week to resume talks on Strand 1, internal Northern Ireland government proposals.
Unionist negotiators were annoyed at the re-emergence of the Framework issue yesterday and insisted the Propositions for Heads of Agreement set the agenda for the talks. The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Andrews, strongly disagreed and asserted the Framework proposals were as relevant now as when first drafted.