David King Alderdice OBE MA (Oxon) FRCPI is a former

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. The Lord Mayor also serves as the representative of the city of Belfast, welcoming guests from across the Un ...

and senior member of the

Alliance Party of Northern Ireland The Alliance Party of Northern Ireland (APNI), or simply Alliance, is a liberal and centrist political party in Northern Ireland. As of the 2022 Northern Ireland Assembly election, it is the third-largest party in the Northern Ireland Assembly, ...

Early life and personal

Born into a Presbyterian manse, Alderdice was educated at Ballymena Academy. His middle name, ”King” is after his great, great, grand uncle, John King, a 19th-century Australian explorer and the sole survivor of the

Burke and Wills expedition The Burke and Wills expedition was organised by the Royal Society of Victoria in Australia in 1860–61. It consisted of 19 men led by Robert O'Hara Burke and William John Wills, with the objective of crossing Australia from Melbourne in the s ...

. He graduated in Medicine from

Queen's University Belfast , mottoeng = For so much, what shall we give back? , top_free_label = , top_free = , top_free_label1 = , top_free1 = , top_free_label2 = , top_free2 = , established = , closed = , type = Public research university , parent = ...

in 1989 and worked as a junior doctor in the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast. He moved to Oxford where he read PPE (1992–94) at Harris Manchester College Oxford. He was an Elder in the Presbyterian Church in Ireland until 2019 when he resigned citing the narrowing of spiritual outlook in PCI and its intolerance of minorities as the reasons for leaving. He is currently a communicant member of First Church Belfast which is the city’s oldest surviving place of worship. His brother is

John Alderdice, Baron Alderdice John Thomas Alderdice, Baron Alderdice (born 28 March 1955) is a Northern Ireland politician. He was the Speaker and a Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly (MLA) for East Belfast from 1998 to 2004 and 1998 to 2003, respectively. Alderdice ...

Professional

As a trainee doctor he worked in Belfast, Oxfordshire and London. He was appointed as Consultant Dermatologist in 2002 initially working in the Causeway Trust (Northern Ireland) and then he moved to the South Eastern Trust in 2010. He is Clinical Director for Cancer Services (South Eastern Trust), Consultant Dermatologist and runs the Northern Ireland Regional Psychodermatology service.

Political career

He joined the Alliance Party in 1985 and was active in Young Alliance and Queens Alliance. He first ran for political office in

Ballymena Ballymena ( ; from ga, an Baile Meánach , meaning 'the middle townland') is a town in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It is part of the Borough of Mid and East Antrim. The town is built on land given to the Adair family by King Charles I i ...

Borough Council elections while a medical student in 1989. He was the first Belfast City Councillor to be elected Lord Mayor of Belfast with votes from both Unionist and Nationalist Councillors. He welcomed many visitors and heads of state to the City in the period after the signing of the

Good Friday Agreement The Good Friday Agreement (GFA), or Belfast Agreement ( ga, Comhaontú Aoine an Chéasta or ; Ulster-Scots: or ), is a pair of agreements signed on 10 April 1998 that ended most of the violence of The Troubles, a political conflict in No ...

, including Vaclav Havel,

Mary Robinson Mary Therese Winifred Robinson ( ga, Máire Mhic Róibín; ; born 21 May 1944) is an Irish politician who was the 7th president of Ireland, serving from December 1990 to September 1997, the first woman to hold this office. Prior to her electi ...

and

Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton ( né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He previously served as governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and agai ...

. During his time as Lord Mayor of Belfast, dissident republicans detonated the Omagh bomb, the worst atrocity of

The Troubles The Troubles ( ga, Na Trioblóidí) were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it is sometimes described as an "i ...

, killing 29 individuals. As leader of the Alliance Party City Hall group, Alderdice took the controversial decision to vote for Councillor

Alex Maskey Alex Maskey (born 8 January 1952) is an Irish politician who has been Speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly since 2020 and was the first member of Sinn Féin to serve as Lord Mayor of Belfast from 2002 to 2003. He was Sinn Féin's longest si ...

Sinn Féin Sinn Féin ( , ; en, " eOurselves") is an Irish republican and democratic socialist political party active throughout both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The original Sinn Féin organisation was founded in 1905 by Arthur Gri ...

to be Lord Mayor in 2002 which resulted in violence from loyalists upon his family and home. He stood down from elected office after submitting his resignation in July 2010 which came into effect at the end of the month.

Honours

He was awarded an OBE in 1999 for services to local government.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Alderdice, David Mayors of Belfast 1966 births Living people