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Hugh Smyth
Hugh Smyth, OBE (1941 – 12 May 2014) was a Northern Irish politician who was leader of the Progressive Unionist Party. He was a former Lord Mayor of Belfast as well as the longest serving member of Belfast City Council, having represented the Upper Shankill Road area since 1973. Smyth was awarded the Order of the British Empire in the 1996 New Year's Honours list. Emergence in politics Born in the Woodvale Road district of the Shankill Road area of Belfast, Smyth was one of nine children and was educated locally and worked as a metal bonder in the Short Brothers factory before entering full-time politics. Smyth first came to attention in the early 1970s when he served as a public spokesman for the Ulster Volunteer Force although he was not an active member of the organisation. His inspiration for politics was the struggle his father endured whilst working to support his family. Deeply opposed to what he described as 'Big House Unionism', he stated that at that time Belfast ...
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Lord Mayor Of Belfast
The Lord Mayor of Belfast is the leader and chairperson of Belfast City Council, elected annually from and by the City's 60 Councillors#UnitedKingdom, councillors. The Lord Mayor also serves as the representative of the city of Belfast, welcoming guests from across the United Kingdom and Ireland. The current Lord Mayor is Tina Black of Sinn Fein who has been in the position of Lord Mayor since 1 June 2022. The Deputy Lord Mayor is Michelle Kelly of the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland, Alliance Party. History The position that is now the Lord Mayor originated in 1613 in the town's Royal Charter as the Sovereign of Belfast. In 1842, this position was restyled the Mayor of Belfast. In 1892, four years after Belfast was granted city status, the position was given Lord Mayor status, making it one of only three cities on the island of Ireland having a Lord Mayor, the other two being Cork (city), Cork and Dublin. In 1929, it became one of only six cities in the United Kingdom to ...
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1973 Northern Ireland Assembly Election
Events January * January 1 - The United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland and Denmark enter the European Economic Community, which later becomes the European Union. * January 15 – Vietnam War: Citing progress in peace negotiations, U.S. President Richard Nixon announces the suspension of offensive action in North Vietnam. * January 17 – Ferdinand Marcos becomes President for Life of the Philippines. * January 20 – Richard Nixon is sworn in for a second term as President of the United States. Nixon is the only person to have been sworn in twice as President ( 1969, 1973) and Vice President of the United States (1953, 1957). * January 22 ** George Foreman defeats Joe Frazier to win the heavyweight world boxing championship. ** A Royal Jordanian Boeing 707 flight from Jeddah crashes in Kano, Nigeria; 176 people are killed. * January 27 – U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War ends with the signing of the Paris Peace Accords. February * February 8 – A military insurr ...
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Long Kesh
Long may refer to: Measurement * Long, characteristic of something of great duration * Long, characteristic of something of great length * Longitude (abbreviation: long.), a geographic coordinate * Longa (music), note value in early music mensural notation Places Asia * Long District, Laos * Long District, Phrae, Thailand * Longjiang (other) or River Long (lit. "dragon river"), one of several rivers in China * Yangtze River or Changjiang (lit. "Long River"), China Elsewhere * Long, Somme, France * Long, Washington, United States People * Long (surname) * Long (surname 龍) (Chinese surname) Fictional characters * Long (''Bloody Roar''), in the video game series Sports * Long, a fielding term in cricket * Long, in tennis and similar games, beyond the service line during a serve and beyond the baseline during play Other uses * , a U.S. Navy ship name * Long (finance), a position in finance, especially stock markets * Lòng, name for a laneway in Shanghai * ...
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Provisional Irish Republican Army
The Irish Republican Army (IRA; ), also known as the Provisional Irish Republican Army, and informally as the Provos, was an Irish republican paramilitary organisation that sought to end British rule in Northern Ireland, facilitate Irish reunification and bring about an independent, socialist republic encompassing all of Ireland. It was the most active republican paramilitary group during the Troubles. It saw itself as the army of the all-island Irish Republic and as the sole legitimate successor to the original IRA from the Irish War of Independence. It was designated a terrorist organisation in the United Kingdom and an unlawful organisation in the Republic of Ireland, both of whose authority it rejected. The Provisional IRA emerged in December 1969, due to a split within the previous incarnation of the IRA and the broader Irish republican movement. It was initially the minority faction in the split compared to the Official IRA, but became the dominant faction by 1 ...
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Irish Republicanism
Irish republicanism ( ga, poblachtánachas Éireannach) is the political movement for the unity and independence of Ireland under a republic. Irish republicans view British rule in any part of Ireland as inherently illegitimate. The development of nationalist and democratic sentiment throughout Europe in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, distilled into the contemporary ideology known as republican radicalism, was reflected in Ireland in the emergence of republicanism, in opposition to British rule. Discrimination against Catholics and Protestant nonconformists, attempts by the British administration to suppress Irish culture, and the belief that Ireland was economically disadvantaged as a result of the Acts of Union were among the specific factors leading to such opposition. The Society of United Irishmen, formed in 1791 and led primarily by liberal Protestants, launched the 1798 Rebellion with the help of troops sent by Revolutionary France, but the upris ...
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David Ervine
David Ervine (21 July 1953 – 8 January 2007) was a Northern Irish Ulster Loyalist politician who served as leader of the Progressive Unionist Party (PUP) from 2002 to 2007, and was also a Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly (MLA) for Belfast East from 1998 to 2007. During his youth Ervine was a member of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and was imprisoned for possessing bomb-making equipment. Whilst in jail he became convinced of the benefits of a more political approach for Ulster loyalism and became involved with the PUP. As a leading PUP figure, Ervine helped to deliver the loyalist ceasefire of 1994. Biography David Ervine was the youngest of five children born to Walter and Elizabeth Ervine, and raised in a Protestant working-class area of east Belfast between the Albertbridge and Newtownards roads. His household was not loyalist at all, his father Walter described himself as a socialist, had no time for Ian Paisley and didn't attend church. When Ervine joined the ...
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Gusty Spence
Augustus Andrew Spence (28 June 1933
. '' (CAIN). Retrieved 5 April 2011.
– 25 September 2011) was a leader of the paramilitary (UVF) and a leading in

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Ulster Defence Association
The Ulster Defence Association (UDA) is an Ulster loyalist paramilitary group in Northern Ireland. It was formed in September 1971 as an umbrella group for various loyalist groups and undertook an armed campaign of almost 24 years as one of the participants of the Troubles. Its declared goal was to defend Ulster Protestant loyalist areas and to combat Irish republicanism, particularly the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA). In the 1970s, uniformed UDA members openly patrolled these areas armed with batons and held large marches and rallies. Within the UDA was a group tasked with launching paramilitary attacks that used the cover name Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF) so that the UDA would not be outlawed. The British government proscribed the UFF as a terrorist group in November 1973, but the UDA itself was not proscribed until August 1992. The UDA/UFF were responsible for more than 400 deaths. The vast majority of its victims were Irish Catholic civilians, – choose "orga ...
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Ulster Nationalism
Ulster nationalism is a minor school of thought in the politics of Northern Ireland that seeks the independence of Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom without joining the Republic of Ireland, thereby becoming an independent sovereign state separate from both. Independence has been supported by groups such as Ulster Third Way and some factions of the Ulster Defence Association. However, it is a fringe view in Northern Ireland. It is neither supported by any of the political parties represented in the Northern Ireland Assembly nor by the government of the United Kingdom or the government of the Republic of Ireland. Although the term Ulster traditionally refers to one of the four traditional provinces of Ireland which contains Northern Ireland as well as parts of the Republic of Ireland, the term is often used within unionism and Ulster loyalism (from which Ulster nationalism originated) to refer to Northern Ireland. History Craig in 1921 In November 1921, du ...
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Northern Ireland Office
The Northern Ireland Office (NIO; ga, Oifig Thuaisceart Éireann, Ulster-Scots: ''Norlin Airlann Oaffis'') is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for Northern Ireland affairs. The NIO is led by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and is based at Erskine House in Belfast City Centre and 1 Horse Guards Road in London. Role The NIO's role is to "maintain and support" the devolution settlement resulting from the Good Friday Agreement and St Andrews Agreement and the devolution of criminal justice and policing to the Northern Ireland Assembly. The department has responsibility for: * electoral law * human rights and equality * national security in Northern Ireland * the UK Government's approach to the legacy of the Troubles It also represents Northern Irish interests at UK Government level and the interests of the UK Government in Northern Ireland. The Northern Ireland Office has a close working relationship with the Government of Ireland as a co-gua ...
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Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention
The Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention (NICC) was an elected body set up in 1975 by the United Kingdom Labour government of Harold Wilson as an attempt to deal with constitutional issues surrounding the status of Northern Ireland. Formation of the Constitutional Convention The idea for a constitutional convention was first mooted by the Northern Ireland Office in its white paper ''The Northern Ireland Constitution'', published on 4 July 1974. The paper laid out plans for elections to a body which would seek agreement on a political settlement for Northern Ireland. The proposals became law with the enactment of the Northern Ireland Act 1974 later that month. With Lord Chief Justice Robert Lowry appointed to chair the new body, elections were announced for 1 May 1975. The elections were held for the 78-member body using the single transferable vote system of proportional representation in each of Northern Ireland's twelve Westminster constituencies. Initially the body ...
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Worker Cooperative
A worker cooperative is a cooperative owned and self-managed by its workers. This control may mean a firm where every worker-owner participates in decision-making in a democratic fashion, or it may refer to one in which management is elected by every worker-owner who each have one vote. History Worker cooperatives rose to prominence during the Industrial Revolution as part of the labour movement. As employment moved to industrial areas and job sectors declined, workers began organizing and controlling businesses for themselves. Worker cooperatives were originally sparked by "critical reaction to industrial capitalism and the excesses of the industrial revolution." Some worker cooperatives were designed to "cope with the evils of unbridled capitalism and the insecurities of wage labor". The philosophy that underpinned the cooperative movement stemmed from the socialist writings of thinkers including Robert Owen and Charles Fourier. Robert Owen, considered by many as the father o ...
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