THE Northern Secretary, Dr Mo Mowlam, has warned Sinn Fein that it can have one more meeting with British officials, after which the so called "settlement train" appears set to leave without it.
At the same time, she has signalled the British government's impatience at the rate of progress in the Stormont talks, naming next May as "the time when we are working towards a settlement and a final vote in referendum".
Dr Mowlam's determined attempt to push the process forward came as additional sources confirmed their belief that the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, could wind the talks up in the autumn if it became clear that agreement would not be forthcoming, as reported in yesterday's Irish Times. During her first Northern Ireland questions session in the Commons yesterday, Dr Mowlam warned MPs: "The talks are in danger of running into the sands." Progress, she said, needed to be made as quickly as possible. And she confirmed that she was working closely with the Irish Government in an attempt to resolve the decommissioning issue, "which would allow us to move on to substantive negotiations in the talks in September".
Dr Mowlam again confirmed the British government's wish to have Sinn Fein in the talks. But she repeated that this would not happen without "an unequivocal ceasefire and a clear commitment to democratic principles".
Her projected timetable, anticipating that substantive negotiations might not get under way until September, was being seen as allowing leeway for any developments on the ceasefire front during the summer. However Dr Mowlam told Mr David Trimble the Ulster Unionist Party leader that the current "clarificatory" talks with Sinn Fein were not "parallel negotiations".
Mr Trimble had warned Dr Mowlam that the government was in danger of losing credibility with people in Northern Ireland if it kept talking to republicans against a background of continuing violence. In her reply, Dr Mowlam said: "These are not parallel negotiations, they are not negotiations in any way at all. We will not go on indefinitely... I said on Tuesday that I was minded to have one more meeting to make sure of what the two positions (Sinn Fein's and the British government's) are . . . My best answer to him is that another meeting is likely and that will be it."
For the Conservatives, the former Northern Ireland minister, Mr Michael Ancram, asked Dr Mowlam to confirm that the British government intended to proceed "on the basis of dialogue and agreement and not imposition". The Northern Secretary told him progress could only be made with the support and accommodation of the two communities: "It is by dialogue and discussion between all the parties. Of course, we are not going to impose an agreement or a settlement on them. We have never, ever suggested that.
"We have supported the Downing Street Declaration and the Framework Document that makes it absolutely clear - and it is the cornerstone of our policy - that consent is crucial to agreement and accommodation in Northern Ireland. It is only by consent of the different communities that any settlement that can last will work. So, in that sense, the answer is a categorical `yes'.