Police reform in Northern Ireland will not be altered if unionists boycott the board overseeing the changes, the British government insisted today.
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Mr Peter Robinson says policing plans could be derailed
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A Northern Ireland Office spokesman rejected claims from the anti-Belfast Agreement DUP that unionists could secure a better policing plan if they united and opposed the current proposals.
As the Rev Ian Paisley's party met at Stormont to consider its response to the government's plan, the NIO said the package was "non-negotiable".
"The government's position was spelt out very clearly by the Secretary of State (John Reid) on Tuesday," a spokesman said.
"The implementation plan is non-negotiable. No rethink will take place. This is the plan." The NIO spokesman was responding to DUP deputy leader Peter Robinson's claim that if David Trimble's Ulster Unionists agreed to join them in withholding support for the plan, the reforms could not go ahead.
Signalling his party would not take its seats on the Policing Board if the UUP did not nominate representatives, he claimed: "At the meeting we held recently with John Reid, he indicated the government could not proceed with the plan if he could not get, on the one hand the support of either the SDLP, Sinn Féin or both, and on the other, the UUP, DUP or both.
"That was the criteria operated the last time around. The government's plans were stopped because neither the SDLP nor Sinn Féin would support it and as a result the reforms were made much more acceptable to nationalists in the SDLP.
"The logical argument, therefore, is if unionists do not support this implementation plan, then it cannot succeed. The government will have to amend it to make it more acceptable to unionists and go back to negotiations.
"Otherwise it would be sending out a message that the government is just not interested in unionist support. If the two unionist parties act in concert, then unionists can stop Reid in his tracks and reel back the concessions he has made."
The Ulster Unionists will not reach a decision on whether they will participate on the board until their leader David Trimble returns from holiday.
Party chairman James Cooper signalled on Tuesday that while the party was not opposed in principle to participating on the board, they had some concerns about the reforms which would need to be addressed.
In a historic move this week, John Hume's SDLP announced it would take part in the board and became the first nationalist party in Northern Ireland to ask members of its supporters to join and support the police.
Sinn Féin, which is entitled to two seats on the board, believes the reforms do not go far enough.
Republicans have hit out at Dr Reid's claim that negotiations on policing are closed.
A Sinn Féin source warned PA Newslast night the British government's stance on policing was endangering progress on other issues in the peace process.
The source argued: "If the government is now insisting the policing plan is as good as it gets for nationalists after having told us all these issues are interlinked, then we must ask ourselves what that means.
"The implementation plan clearly falls short of Patten and needs a lot more work done on it if it is to become acceptable to the nationalist community.
"So in the light of John Reid's comments, we must ask ourselves if policing is off the table, how can we resolve all the other issues such as demilitarisation, arms, the equality agenda?
"By pulling down the shutters on the negotiations, he is actually laying the foundations for a worse crisis when the current six-week period before an election of a first and deputy first minister ends."
PA