Image source, Reuters

Rishi Sunak has urged the DUP to get back to Stormont before the midnight deadline to trigger an election.

Asked what the prime minister's message is, his official spokesman said: "There's still time for the DUP and executive to get back to Stormont and we urge them to do so because the people of Northern Ireland deserve a fully functioning and locally elected executive which can respond to the issues facing the communities there.

"That was the Northern Ireland secretary's message to all party leaders when they met yesterday but clearly the Northern Ireland secretary has a statutory duty."

TUV leader Jim Allister says that the protocol is "dismantling the union" and that Sinn Féin are it's "greatest supporters".

Mr Allister finished by saying that the no surrender slogan is a "present day necessity",

"[DUP's] focus on the Protocol is designed to divide people, to ramp up tensions", says People Before Profit's Gerry Carroll.

Mr Carroll has appealed to ministers for support of union strikers. He says election or not, he will be back on the picket lines.

"I would urge [the DUP] to stop playing with people's lives and get back into government, however, make no mistake about it, we know a restored executive won't be the silver bullet that some may suggest."

UUP leader Doug Beattie calls for the assembly to 'come together' to support our economy, employment and "the nurse's pay claims".

"It is going to focus our minds in the middle of December if our nurses are on a picket-line and we are going out asking for votes" he said.

Mr Beattie underlined his point by adding the assembly needs to "get back to work" to promote for the people of Northern Ireland who are "suffering",

"All they are getting out of here from leadership is silence except for the argues and the rants."

Mr O'Toole said an election would "simply serve to polarise and waste millions at a time when people are in need and public services are collapsing".

"It would stretch the elastic of public confidence," he added.

The South Belfast MLA said: "The DUP seem set on turning this place into an ungoverned and ungovernable mess, that is a tragedy for everyone that lives here."

SDLP MLA Matthew O'Toole referenced the cost-of-living crisis and said while Stormont has remained silent "people's homes have gotten colder" and "trust in politics have fallen".

He said he is "ashamed of this place" and what they were doing in the assembly today.

Mr O'Toole said "another election would be a farce".

Ulster Unionist leader Doug Beattie says the anger in the chamber today is "nothing compared to the anger in the towns and villages across Northern Ireland".

"I guess we are all going to feel that anger in the next six or seven weeks," he said.

Shane Harrison
BBC NI Dublin correspondent

Yesterday in the Dáil, the Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald called for a form of joint authority to be exercised by the British and Irish governments n the event of a prolonged failure to restore the political institutions in Northern Ireland.

It's not the first time there has been such a call.

But the 1998 Good Friday Agreement does not allow for such an eventuality.

Image source, Pacemaker

Instead the British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference (BIIGC) gives Dublin a consultative role when the Northern Ireland Assembly is suspended.

On Wednesday, the Taoiseach Mícheál Martin said his government would “exhaust every possibility” to “fully pursue” its consultative role.

In the past a Labour-led British government and its Irish counterpart used such a threat to encourage the DUP, then led by Ian Paisley, to restore the political institutions.

But whether that same threat – perceived by some as Joint Authority-lite – carries the same menace is a moot point given the different political circumstances including a Tory-led British government.

Alliance's Naomi Long says she will take not lectures from the DUP when it comes to issues of respect or reform.

Ms Long says public services are "on their knees" or "teetering on the brink" and asks whether assembly members care enough over party political interests.

"I think the previous speaker gave us an insight as to what their answer is going to be."

"Giving what we've heard already, there's little to be said in this debate," says Alliance leader Naomi Long as she highlights how the lack of an executive impacts the people of Northern Ireland.

"We care only that someone will occupy that [Speaker's] chair".

Image source, Getty Images

The former first minister Paul Givan said his party would "not be afraid of another election".

He says unionism is being "excluded" and other parties are seeking to "threaten unionism".

“Progress will not be made by trying to isolate, denigrate and intimidate the DUP," he says.

“The DUP supports devolution. We are ready to appoint ministers today. The barrier to devolution is not the DUP – it is the Northern Ireland Protocol.”

Michelle O’Neill finished her remarks by saying there would be no return to the direct rule of the past.

“But for the avoidance of doubt let’s also be clear.

“If the DUP continue to block power-sharing, let’s be clear Direct Rule as we have known it in the past, is not an option. The alternative to power-sharing is Joint Authority from London and Dublin.”

The Alliance Party's Kellie Armstrong raises a point of order to ask if the vote to elect a speaker is being carried out as a cross-community vote.

Stewart Dickson confirms the vote will be on that basis as set out in the workings of the assembly.

The election of a speaker requires a majority of both the unionist and nationalist designations in the assembly, while the Alliance Party are designated as other.

Image source, Getty Images

DUP MLA Paul Givan said the recall of this assembly is a "flawed and failed attempt of forming an executive".

He said the unionist mandate has been "disrespected".

Mr Givan said power sharing has to about "consent" and not contempt.

Sinn Fein vice president Michelle O'Neill said "people will be watching on bewildered".

Speaking in the chamber, she said: "Most of us here want to do the job we were elected to do.

"Today our caretaker ministers rally to take decisions, within tight limits, before their civil servants are left in an impossible position come midnight where they are expected to run our essential public services yet have no budget and no powers."

In the chamber, Sinn Fein vice president Michelle O'Neill blamed Jeffery Donaldson and the DUP for the failure to form an executive.

"Jeffrey Donaldson and the DUP are in a perpetual stand-off with the public, the majority of whom they do not speak for, or indeed represent.

"He stood for election yet failed to show up.

"This is his mess, and a failure of leadership by him and his party.

Image source, Getty Images

"Jeffrey Donaldson and the DUP have left us all at the mercy of a heartless and dysfunctional Tory government, whose own survival is all that counts.

"The facts are that in May of this year, people voted for change."

The first order of business is electing a speaker.

The SDLP's Matthew O'Toole nominated Patsy McGlone as speaker.

Ulster Unionist Mike Nesbitt was also proposed by his party leader Doug Beattie.

Both men accepted the nominations, now the parties will speak.

Image source, Pacemaker

In the absence of a speaker, Alliance Assembly member Stewart Dickson is chairing proceedings in the chamber.

He is the second oldest elected MLA.

The eldest Alan Chambers is not in the chamber today.

At a press briefing prior to the Assembly recall, the DUP's leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson has confirmed he will not elect a speaker today.

"We do not believe that sufficient progress has been made", says Donaldson.

He says he will not nominate a speaker until "decisive action" is action over his party's ongoing concerns over the Northern Ireland Protocol.

Mark Simpson
BBC News NI

Image source, Pacemaker

In the corridors at Stormont, there is an end-of-term feeling, and a sense that an election campaign has already begun.

The current Assembly is not even six months old but it is likely to end before it got properly started.

Michelle O’Neill of Sinn Fein was supposed to be First Minister, with Sir Jeffrey Donaldson as Deputy First Minister.

Instead, there have been 24 weeks of stalemate.

Next, the likelihood is a seven-week election campaign, with Thursday 15 December pencilled into most politicians’ diaries.