The dissident Ulster Unionist Assembly member, Mr Peter Weir, lost the party whip yesterday. Another party colleague resigned in protest because Mr Weir was not expelled.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) will table a motion of no confidence in the Initial Presiding Officer of the Assembly, Lord Alderdice. Party representatives told him of their intentions at a meeting yesterday and outlined their anger at what they saw as his failure to adhere to standing orders on Monday.
"He himself announced that this would be a three-day debate," said the Rev Ian Paisley. Dr Paisley was enraged by a guillotine vote, which approved the report on the pre-Christmas UUP-SDLP pact on government departments and the setting up of North-South bodies and ended debate on the issue. Two DUP members failed to make it into the chamber.
The repercussions continued from the decision taken by the Ulster Unionist Assembly member, Mr Peter Weir, to vote against his party in the same ballot. The UUP deputy whip, Mr Duncan Shipley Dalton, resigned his position in protest when the party leadership failed to expel Mr Weir.
The party leader, Mr David Trimble, and the party chief whip, Mr Jim Wilson, yesterday disciplined Mr Weir at a meeting of the Assembly group. In a statement the party said it was withdrawing the whip from the representative for North Down. However, it continued that if Mr Weir decided to support party policy in the future "then his position could be reconsidered".
Mr Weir said he was "saddened but not surprised" by the action taken by the party. He failed to attend the Assembly group meeting yesterday but said later that he did not regret his actions. Mr Weir will be excluded from Assembly party meetings and lose his committee position along with his post as party spokesman on culture, arts and leisure.
Mr Shipley Dalton said he was "appalled" that the party had adopted what he considered to be a soft approach.
Commenting on the exclusion of Mr Weir, the UUP deputy leader, Mr John Taylor, said: "It's regrettable that Peter took the action that he did. But he didn't accept the three-line whip and the standard procedure for any party in the Assembly is that you exclude yourself if you don't accept the three-line whip."
Mr Taylor dismissed DUP allegations that other UUP members had had their arms "twisted up their backs" before the chamber vote on the First and Deputy First Ministers' report.
The UUP Assembly member, Sir Reg Empey, also rejected the allegation made by the DUP's Mr Ian Paisley jnr. "The only bully-boy tactics that I saw were groups of DUP members blocking the door of the chamber, trying to prevent the door-keepers from closing the doors. That's on camera," he said.