cheering. the snp remain the largest party in scottish councils with labour overtaking the conservatives to finish second. labour was the biggest winner in wales, where the conservatives lost more than 80 seats. in other news, more attempts are being made to rescue civilians trapped at a steelworks in the beseiged ukrainian city of mariupol. 50 people were taken out of the city yesterday. chelsea get their new owners terms have been agreed, with the consortium led by american todd bowly. good afternoon and welcome to bbc news. sinn fein is on track to win the most seats in the northern ireland assembly for the first time ever signalling a historic shift in the political landscape. let s cross live to belfast and get all the latest from annita mcveigh. thank you very muchjoanna and welcome back. as you say, sinn fein and course to emerge as the biggest party from these elections, a huge moment for nationalists and undoubtedly with constitutional questions raised by that
If they can iron out the concerns that the unionists, the dup and the tuv party is half but it is worth remembering that, actually, the majority of politicians who will be re elected to this executive actually either in favour of the political or as we just heard on the ulster unionist party have issues with able can work with it within a government so lots of difficulties to be ironed out. back to you joanna. . ~ to be ironed out. back to you joanna. ., ~ , ., to be ironed out. back to you joanna. ., ~ ~ ., . to be ironed out. back to you joanna. ., ~ ., . joanna. thank you anita. we can take a look at what joanna. thank you anita. we can take a look at what happened joanna. thank you anita. we can take a look at what happened in joanna. thank you anita. we can take a look at what happened in the - joanna. thank you anita. we can take a look at what happened in the local i a look at what happened in the local elections elsewhere. conservatives lost control of 11 councils across
Thatis are within a historic context are that is big because of cult sinn fein are dedicated to an irish republic and now the top party in northern ireland and stormont used to always be associated with unionism and also if you look down at the buzzer that pecking order 25 years ago at the time of the good friday agreement these were the good parties that actually did the deal. several of them are now completely blown away. those first minister and deputy first minister position is knotin deputy first minister position is knot in the running at all for them. quite a shift in the best two and a half decades almost. constitutional questions seem to be grabbing the lion s share of the headlines but then you have all those bread and butter issues. whether those two dynamics that at this point because that is a question about whether the executive can actually return to some internet functioning way? actually return to some internet functioning way? exactly. the two are connected functio
Terms of the dup s panicking with the fact that is extremely badly in a recent opinion polls, standing at 17% in the most recent poll compared to sinn fein s 25%, which means that if in the coming election, it s quite probable that sinn fein will take the first ministry, which unionists are extremely unhappy about. the dup seems to be bidding to get the more hard line unionist boats which were supposed to be going or were projected to go to traditional unionist voices parties. but the part of problem with that is the tuv party is a post of the good friday agreement, so if the dup makes disc cable to get their votes to get a higher proportion of the unionist boats, it will be striking an alliance of the party which is not readily going to agree to.