Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and British prime minister Tony Blair will meet in Downing Street next week, as the British and Irish governments plan how to inject momentum into the political process after this week's confirmation of IRA decommissioning.
Mr Blair is also due to visit Northern Ireland in late October or November to spell out to politicians that he expects real political progress if Independent Monitoring Commission reports next month and in January state the IRA is inactive.
Sinn Féin and DUP delegations will also meet Mr Blair in London next week. Dublin and London acknowledge there is little prospect of pushing the political process forward until after the IMC report in January.
Despite the negative response to disarmament from DUP leader the Rev Ian Paisley, the governments see real opportunity for movement in the new year. A senior London source said: "The purpose of the prime minister's visit after the IMC October report - if it states the IRA is meeting its commitments - is to set out where we can go from here. He will make it clear that he is not going to allow political drift.
"I think the political dynamic is beginning to change. I think people are beginning to see that the IRA decommissioning is significant and that Ian Paisley has played it wrong, particularly his questioning of the bona fides of the Protestant witness, Harold Good"
Gen John de Chastelain's decommissioning body said that what the IRA decommissioned was consistent with the British and Irish security assessment of its stockpiles.
Northern Secretary Peter Hain refused to disclose what the British security assessment was, arguing this would compromise British intelligence services and its sources.
But Mr Hain told delegates at the British Labour Party conference in Brighton yesterday that efforts to restore devolution in Northern Ireland must begin in earnest in January, if the IRA remains inactive.
Mr Hain said that following the July IRA statement ending its armed campaign and Monday's decommissioning announcement, Northern Ireland was at a "key moment" that demanded a "courageous" response from politicians.
"Now this week, with the hugely significant announcement by the independent decommissioning body that the IRA has put its entire arsenal of arms beyond use, we have a chance to make the progress for which we have worked for so long," he told the conference.
"And if, in January, the Independent Monitoring Commission confirms a complete end to IRA activity, then the time will have come for every person in Northern Ireland, unionist or nationalist, to grasp this opportunity for peace, this historic opportunity to move forward with genuine political engagement."
The Northern Secretary said the lesson of the years since the Belfast Agreement of 1998 was that real political progress can only be made when "paramilitaries leave the stage" and that violence does not pay.
"That lesson was eventually learnt by republicans; it's high time it was learnt by loyalists too. We condemn utterly their vicious assaults - and their murder attempts - on the police. And we tell them straight: they will not succeed. The IRA has decommissioned its arms. The loyalist paramilitaries must now do so, too."
In recent weeks Mr Hain has informed politicians and the public that the North will face new water charges and higher rate bills in line with England and Wales. He said yesterday that in the absence of devolution, which was an "overriding objective", Northern Ireland could not continue to "tread water".
Consequently, he and his Northern Ireland Office ministers in the coming weeks would be announcing a series of reforms and initiatives. These would include reducing the number of local councils in the North, details about ending the 11-plus primary transfer exam, making more money available for childcare, and restructuring the health service.
