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Despite keeping themselves out of stormont that the majority of the last parliamentary term and there are serious concerns here. movement numbers and movement on seats is very very small. sinn fein like likely to maybe gain one and deeply likely to maybe gain one and deeply likely to maybe gain one and deeply likely to lose two or three. a small movement has led to sinn fein being eligible for the first minister position. in the view of the dup and unionists they will try to use that to disproportionately spin that this is a movement and momentum towards irish unity. it is not, the figures are still very stable but of course the big thing for northern ireland at the moment is the protocol issue. mixed messages coming from london and the secretary of state with quite an unfortunate intervention just the night before the election saying that perhaps this legislation wouldn t be brought forward but the reality is one thing power sharing is not going to return here. itir. is not going to r
We can speak now to emma little pengelly, a former mp and mla for the democratic unionist party. thanks forjoining us on bbc news and we appreciate your time today. just give us an overview of what do you be sitting? you be sitting? they have had a disappointing you be sitting? they have had a disappointing election - you be sitting? they have had a disappointing election were - you be sitting? they have had a disappointing election were not| you be sitting? they have had a i disappointing election were not as bad as some had predicted. before the election dup had been on 28 seats and there had been a leadership issue within the dup and they had lost one of those seats in north down and he s stood as an election and got elected so there were 27 seats from the 28 they ran last time. in this election it looks likely they will lose at least two seats, possibly three. the interesting thing is that is not a huge movement of seats but on the union aside there has been a factoring effect d
Belfast under two centres and after a really long day yesterday the energy is back in building this morning. i mjust energy is back in building this morning. i m just trying to listen as i talk to you and i m not sure if this is a declaration or if one of the returning officers is telling us about the latest stage in the counting because of course this is a type of proportional representational election, not first past the post, and there are lots and lots of stages which is why, part of the reason anyway why. .. applause this count is taking so long. let s listen in for a second if we can. ladies and gentlemen that concludes the count ladies and gentlemen that concludes the count for the belfast south constituency. my thanks to the candidates and the staff are all the hard work candidates and the staff are all the hard work. the formal announcement of the hard work. the formal announcement of the resutt hard work. the formal announcement of the result apple will take place at th
Moment but first let s assess where we have got two of the day one of the count with the ireland correspondent chris page. applause for the first time, a party which wants to take northern ireland out of the uk is expected to be its largest political force. sinn fein was a long way ahead of its rivals in the first stage of the count. the party s vice president, michelle o neill, is the favourite to become first minister. she would be the first irish nationalist to take the position. obviously i feel very positive. i mean, we fought a very positive campaign. we told people about what we were for. we said this was an election about the future. it s going to be potentially a historic election for many reasons, but i think it s because people wanted us to talk about how we wanted to work together in partnership with others. that s the only way we ll achieve much, much more for people here. another big sign of change came with the success of the cross community alliance party. it is neither