Stormants politicians seem to agree on very little these days,

but there was near unanimity last week that they'd certainly not covered themselves in glory

with their protracted wrangling over the latest COVID restrictions.

So is a five-party coalition always going to struggle with the challenges of governing during a pandemic?

And is there an argument that the time might just have come to think

again about the wisdom of mandatory coalition? Sam? I think, Mark, the answer to those two

questions is obviously yes. Whether the time has come to create a mandatory coalition right now

is quite different to thinking about it. Is the middle of a pandemic the right time to do

anything other than try to get through the pandemic? I'm not sure. But I think that what is clear

is that while there are difficulties from having a mandatory coalition, some of what happened last

week, some of what has happened over recent weeks, is not really even blamable on that.

It is simple, basic rank incompetence, nothing more, nothing less.

And whatever structure you had, you would have these problems if people behaved in the same way that they behaved over recent days.

Suzanne?

I think a pandemic should be something which unites the five parties at Stormont. I don't think mandatory

coalition should be a problem during a pandemic. I understand if they have difficulties, for

example, on an Irish language act. They had difficulties before on issues like abortion and same-sex

marriage, but Westminster has dealt with those. They have difficulties

on Brexit. But a killer virus, which kills people of all religions and none, is most

definitely not an orange or green issue, as the parties keep saying, but they don't act that

way. In terms of perhaps moving towards voluntary coalition, I think it's a fantasy. It's something

that we discuss here, that bloggers discuss, but in reality, I can't see the parties agreeing

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