Peter Hain has insisted Northern Ireland's political "groundhog day" must come to an end, while again warning "the consequences are serious" if the political parties fail to reach agreement by the November 24th deadline.
Addressing the final day of the Labour Party conference, the Northern Ireland Secretary also repeated his view that the parties in the North - "and the DUP in particular" - face a historic choice "between the past and the future".
Mr Hain was speaking shortly after a DUP breakfast fringe event where he heard the Rev Ian Paisley assert he would "not respond to threats or bullying" or to suggestions that he would be denied the same access to a future prime minister should the November deadline fall.
Mr Hain chaired the DUP event for a small invited audience which included Irish Ambassador Daithí Ó Ceallaigh, NIO ministers and a number of senior Labour backbench MPs. But Mr Hain's role as host did not stop Dr Paisley telling him he did not believe he had the authority to say what the attitude of a future prime minister would be. While denying any thought of "playing off" Gordon Brown against Tony Blair, the DUP leader said he had not been invited to Downing Street for two years after the Belfast Agreement "and I slept very well and enjoyed my life".
And while pledging to work through the issues in the St Andrews negotiations the week after next, Dr Paisley said he did not accept that the curtain should come down if they failed - adding that he did not envisage they would succeed.
Mr Hain joked that Dr Paisley's "warm and placatory words" had filled him with optimism and "opened up the route map to agreement" on a powersharing deal by November.
Accentuating the positive, Mr Hain also said he agreed with Dr Paisley that "Sinn Féin have to come up to the mark on policing and the rule of law". But while agreeing with the DUP leader that "bullying and threats do not work", the Secretary of State equally firmly told him: "I just do not think we can keep going round the same circle".
That was also Mr Hain's unrepentant message barely an hour later when he told Labour delegates: "Northern Ireland has seen many deadlines. Seen many come. Seen many go. But this one we've put in law." With Dr Paisley and his son, Ian Paisley jnr, sitting in the body of the hall, Mr Hain went on: "The process cannot be allowed to become an end in itself. People in Northern Ireland are sick and tired of having their very own political 'groundhog day' - and it's time it came to an end."
Mr Hain said: "By November 24th, less than two months from now, the political parties in Northern Ireland - and the DUP in particular - face a historic decision."