SDLP leader Mr Mark Durkan this evening warned against letting the Northern Ireland political process go into "open drift".
He said the Irish and British governments had to make visible movements to prove they were committed to implementing the joint declaration.
Mr Durkan was speaking after a meeting in Dublin with Minister for Foreign Affairs Mr Brian Cowen.
"It was a very useful meeting and covered a lot of ground," he said.
"It focused on the need for the governments to follow through with the implementation of the joint declaration.
"And more importantly in the medium to long term the need to work towards having the institutions up and running - that we do have elections that should have already taken place but are not taking place."
He added: "We are just concerned that the two governments need to be making clear that it is the agenda they are working on."
He said he hoped they were not expecting somebody else to pick up the process in the Autumn.
The British and Irish governments released their plan for the implementation of the Belfast Agreement last month despite their failure to persuade the IRA to make any clear commitment to ending paramilitary activity.
Assembly elections scheduled for May 29th in Northern Ireland were also cancelled.
But the Taoiseach and the British Prime Minister vowed to press ahead with the implementation of sections of the joint declaration which are not dependent on acts of completion from the IRA.