Cameron gravely concerned but rules out suspending Assembly

British prime minister David Cameron has expressed grave concern over the crisis engulfing Stormont, but ruled out suspending the Assembly in a conversation with Northern First Minister Peter Robinson.

Mr Robinson has asked his DUP colleague Arlene Foster to take over as acting First Minister.

He made the move after the party failed to secure support to adjourn the Assembly to allow crisis talks on the implications of the killing of Kevin McGuigan.

Northern Secretary Theresa Villiers conceded working relations had completely broken down, but said she would not suspend the Stormont institutions.

A Downing Street spokesman said: “The prime minister is gravely concerned about the situation. Earlier, he spoke with Peter Robinson.

“While acknowledging the gravity of the situation, the prime minister told Mr Robinson that the UK government did not believe it would be right to introduce emergency legislation now to suspend the Assembly.

Options

“They discussed options for what more the UK government could do to comprehensively address all remaining paramilitary activity in Northern

Ireland

.

“The PM underlined the need for intensive cross-party talks to identify ways to tackle all paramilitary groups and to get on with implementation of the Stormont House Agreement.”

The adjournment proposal was put before Stormont's business committee, where it was rejected by the Ulster Unionist Party, Sinn Féin and the SDLP.

After the vote, Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness said if the DUP were to resign from the Executive, an election would follow. “I don’t think people want an election at this time,” he added.

UUP leader Mike Nesbitt called on Ms Villiers to suspend the Assembly. "This is about a murder, the status of the IRA in 2015," he said.

“We need suspension of institutions and of salaries of Members of the Legislative Assembly. We call on secretary of state to take action.”

But Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams said the institutions should not be suspended.

“I hope that both [Britain and Ireland] support the integrity of these institutions and make it clear that they will not suspend the institutions,” he said, after the DUP’s motion was voted down, describing the Executive as fledgling and difficult but “still better than a war institution”.

Betrayal

Alliance leader

David Ford

, whose party backed the adjournment, heavily criticised the UUP and SDLP, accusing them of betraying past generations of their parties that helped forge the Belfast Agreement.

"John Hume and David Trimble sacrificed their parties for the sake of the peace process," he said.

“Today the current leadership of the Ulster Unionists and SDLP has sacrificed the peace process. For what?”

Ms Villiers said she would not suspend the devolved institutions despite the “very grave” situation.

“It is a sign of a complete breakdown in the working relationships within the Executive,” she added.

“Powersharing only works effectively if you can have effective relationships between parties from different sides of the community and different parts of the political spectrum.”

Ms Villiers yesterday chaired talks with Minister for Foreign Affairs Charlie Flanagan at Stormont between the five main Northern Ireland parties.

“I will be working and continuing to work with determination with the prime minister, with the Northern Ireland parties and with colleagues in the Northern Ireland government to get a way through these crises and find a resolution to the hugely important challenges we now face,” she said.