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Basil McCrea of NI21 says "I don't understand what has gone so badly wrong".

He says there is something "fundamentally amiss with our political process if after months of discussions we can't come to some form of agreed position".

Mr McCrea says Sinn Fein have talked repeatedly about their mandate and that the Conservatives have no mandate here.

"Mandates are all very well, but if you don't have any money, you have to go and talk to people in a particular way," he says, adding, "If Northern Ireland was self financing, we can do what we want. But where we get a subvention of £10bn out of £20bn that we spend, then you have to go and talk to people in a correct way".