"It's disgraceful that the UDP has been forced out of them talks," said Mrs Sandra Murray as she queued to pay for her groceries in a shop on the Shankill Road in Belfast yesterday.
"That wee lad McMichael is doing his best. You can tell he wants peace. The other politicians should be helping him, not giving him a hard time."
A driver of a black taxi said he had mixed feelings about the peace process and didn't know whether the UDP should bother returning in a few weeks, even if the two governments and the other parties permitted it.
"Look, everybody wants peace. Nobody wants a return to violence. Taxi-drivers are being shot. I don't want to be shot and I don't want any of my friends or neighbours to be shot.
"But the whole process is geared towards republicans. There seems to be very little in it for loyalists. It isn't our prisoners who are being released.
"It turns my stomach to see Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness still at the negotiating table - and we all know their backgrounds - when a loyalist party is shown the door. There is something badly wrong."
Two of his passengers, who are unemployed and in their early 30s, were even angrier. They didn't want their surnames printed. But one of them, Alan, said: "The UDP should now realise they're wasting their time at the talks. They shouldn't go back even if the government gets down on bended knee and begs them.
"All the government wants to do is please the Provisional IRA. The hands of Sinn Fein are drenched in blood, yet they have been allowed to stay at the talks. Those people don't care about peace. They only want to force the Protestant community into a united Ireland."
His friend, Jim, said he wasn't interested in the peace process and no loyalist "worth his salt" should sit down with Sinn Fein anyway. He blamed recent Catholic deaths on republicans, not loyalists.
"The INLA killed Billy Wright and started this whole thing off. No one would have been killed if that hadn't happened. If Catholics want peace, then they should tell their terrorists to stop killing Protestants."
Ms May Blood, a community worker on the Shankill, said she supported the peace process but believed the UDP shouldn't have been forced to withdraw from the talks.
"They represent a lot of people in this area. What happens now to all the ordinary men and women who voted UDP? The electoral mandate they gave the party has been cast aside. You can't just ignore people."
Ms Blood said she vehemently opposed sectarian killings but believed the parties associated with paramilitary groups still had to be at talks regardless of what was happening on the streets.
"I am appalled by the killing of ordinary Catholics. I know the parties have all signed up to the Mitchell Principles and a moral issue is at stake. But the violence will only get worse if people are barred from the negotiations and we return to megaphone diplomacy. There are a lot of parties at the talks, but let's not fool ourselves. The UDP, the PUP and Sinn Fein are the only ones who can deliver peace. They alone can save lives. The withdrawal of the UDP is very, very depressing."
Mr Jimmy Creighton, a community worker in the Glencairn estate, said it was better that the UDP had left the talks than being thrown out. "They showed very wise and mature judgment in leaving voluntarily. It was the best choice in a bad range of options.
"UDP leaders are very sincere people. They have worked hard to hold certain other elements in the loyalist community back at key times. By walking out themselves, they put the peace process first. Had they been expelled, there would have been hell to pay."
Helen, another Shankill resident, said: "The UDP decision was great. They made a dignified exit. Without that, the peace process would have been totally undermined in this community. Some of the young fellas are very ruthless. They would have used the UDP's expulsion to say politics doesn't work. At least now, there is some faith left in the process. The way is open for the UDP to come back and help hammer out a settlement that will let us all live in peace."