The Reverend Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionists were today accused of looking for cover to enable them to go into government with Sinn Fein.
In his first speech to the Ulster Unionist Council's annual general meeting since becoming leader nine months ago, Sir Reg Empey launched a hard-hitting attack on his rivals, accusing them of accelerating concessions to republicans rather than stopping them.
Despite heavy losses to the DUP in last year's Westminster and local government elections, the East Belfast Assembly member insisted the Ulster Unionists were more resilient than some of their critics and rivals believed.
He told UUC delegates in Belfast: "It would be easy - too easy in fact - to take pot shots at the DUP. "But the fact is that their failure to deliver is having an impact on all of us.
"Neither this party, nor the pro-Union electorate at large, can take any satisfaction when the DUP drops the ball.
"Yet after eight years of telling us that they had all the answers the DUP has stopped nothing, changed nothing and delivered nothing - not a Fair Deal, not a Fairer Deal, not a Fairly Similar Deal, not even a Fairytale Deal!"
He continued: "They won electoral success on a promise to prevent any more concessions. Far from stopping concessions, they have accelerated.
"They are learning that it is not as easy as they thought to deal with a government that puts its own interests first.
"They will end up in government with Sinn Fein - even the famous dogs in the street know that - it is all about finding enough cover, whether from the IMC, which they opposed, or the Prime Minister, for whom they have contempt."
The former Stormont Economy Minister accused republicans of acting in bad faith in the peace process by maintaining the IRA's links to criminality.
He also claimed Tony Blair's Government had yielded to republican threats to return to violence and the result had been a catastrophic loss of unionist confidence in the process.
With Mr Blair and Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern planning a road map for reviving the Northern Ireland Assembly which will be unveiled next month, Sir Reg said Stormont could be recalled before the summer.
However he cautioned against an Assembly which was a mere talking shop.