Political parties in Northern Ireland are "up for" doing what is necessary to reach a deal, the Taoiseach has told the Dáil. Marie O'Halloran reports.
"The difficulty is that they are not talking to each other," Mr Ahern said, but the "choreography is good". He agreed that it was the DUP "refusing to engage" with Sinn Féin rather than vice versa but "the effect is the same to me if the two parties do not meet each other and I am in the middle."
Mr Ahern believed, however, that the DUP was prepared to work to obtain consensus. "I have had a number of meetings with DUP representatives over the last six months and I think they are quite advanced now about moving forward from where I perceived them to be in the past."
He had some concerns about the pace of events and "whether the DUP is prepared to move quickly", but he believed their key issues were decommissioning and the ending of paramilitarism. "In its overall thinking about North-South issues, the DUP has a more forward-looking view than I would have thought, even a year ago."
The Labour leader, Mr Pat Rabbitte, had asked Mr Ahern for his "realistic assessment" of the prospects for success in the autumn talks given that the DUP seemed quite optimistic but Sinn Féin described the latest talks as a "waste of time". Mr Rabbitte asked was there a "Plan B" if the September talks failed.
Mr Ahern said that "if you're asking me whether I am confident, I'd fall a good bit short of that. To give my best assessment I think the parties are up for doing what's necessary." He said that if they went past the first anniversary of the (Northern Ireland elections) and did not move to a position of working together to "get on with it", things could move into January, "which looks as if it could be a run into a general election in Britain" and he knew "the difficulties that will cause".
He said that with both sides, "particularly those in the driving seat", if the "game goes back and forward like ping-pong and everyone else is outside watching it", it would create a lot of problems.
