Mark Langhammer | |
---|---|
Member of Newtownabbey Borough Council | |
In office 19 May 1993 –5 May 2005 | |
Preceded by | District created |
Succeeded by | John Scott |
Constituency | Macedon |
Personal details | |
Political party | Labour Party |
Other political affiliations | Independent Newtownabbey Labour Party |
Mark Langhammer is a Northern Irish trade unionist,employed as Director of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers and elected onto the Northern Ireland Committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions in 2008,being re-elected in 2010. A former politician in Northern Ireland,he was previously a prominent northern-based member of the Irish Labour Party.
Initially a community activist in North Belfast's Rathcoole housing estate,Langhammer first became involved in politics in the 1980s,joining the Campaign for Labour Representation,which aimed to persuade the British Labour Party to organise in Northern Ireland. [1] In 1989,he stood in the European Parliament election as a "Labour Representation" candidate,polling 3,540 votes. [2]
Langhammer stood unsuccessfully for Newtownabbey Borough Council in Doagh Road in 1985 for the 'All Night Party'. [3]
Langhammer was elected to Newtownabbey Borough Council as a Newtownabbey Labour candidate for Macedon electoral area in 1993. [4] The Campaign for Labour Representation disbanded,having accepted that the British Labour Party had no intention of organising in Northern Ireland,and Langhammer instead began lobbying the Irish Labour Party to do so. [1]
Langhammer was initially recognised as the leader of the Labour coalition,formed in 1996 to contest elections to the Northern Ireland Forum. [1] He headed the group's list in the Belfast North constituency,but this took only 571 votes,and he was not elected. [5] He also took third position on the Coalition's regional list,but only the first two candidates were successful. [6] Amid turmoil in the Coalition,Langhammer refused to take part in the talks which led to the Good Friday Agreement,holding that the set-up for them was "institutionalised sectarianism". [1]
Langhammer held his council seat in 1997 and 2001 before standing down in 2005. [4] In 2002,he was injured in a pipe bomb attack,which police attributed to loyalist paramilitaries. [7]
In 2003,the Irish Labour Party began admitting members in the north,and the following year,Langhammer became the Chair of the Northern Ireland Labour Forum,the local branch of the party. In 2005,he was unsuccessful in elections to the Irish Labour Party National Executive Committee (NEC),but was co-opted on the proposal of Kathleen Lynch. [1]
Langhammer stood down from the NEC in 2008. Langhammer unsuccessfully proposed a motion for the party to contest council elections in Northern Ireland at the 2009 Irish Labour Party conference,which was defeated. Although remaining a Labour Party member,Langhammer is no longer active in the Party,or its Northern Ireland Constituency Party.[ citation needed ]
In 2001 Langhammer campaigned to have a permanent Police Service of Northern Ireland presence established in the loyalist Rathcoole area,where the South East Antrim Brigade of the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) was particularly noted for racketeering and violence.
Following Langhammer's campaigning the police agreed to establish a clinic at a local community centre although this initiative raised the ire of the local UDA Brigadier John Gregg who saw it as a threat to his criminal empire. [8] In September that same year a pipe bomb was left under Langhammer's car outside his Whiteabbey home although it exploded in the early hours with no one hurt. [9]
From 1994 until 1998,Langhammer was the Chair of the Northern Ireland Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux. He was subsequently the Chair of Playboard NI. [1]
He is a Director of Crusaders F.C. [10]
Langhammer's grandfather was Franz Langhammer,a socialist councillor in the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia. Franz Langhammer was forced to flee the country when the Nazis invaded in 1938 and he opted to move to Northern Ireland as he felt his background as a printer would help him to obtain work in the then thriving textile industry. [11]
Newtownabbey Borough Council was a Local Authority in County Antrim in Northern Ireland,on the north shore of Belfast Lough just immediately north of Belfast. The Council merged with Antrim Borough Council in April 2015 under local government reform in Northern Ireland to form Antrim and Newtownabbey Borough Council.
The Vanguard Unionist Progressive Party (VUPP),informally known as Ulster Vanguard,was a unionist political party which existed in Northern Ireland between 1972 and 1978. Led by William Craig,the party emerged from a split in the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) and was closely affiliated with several loyalist paramilitary groups. The party was set up in opposition to power sharing with Irish nationalist parties. It opposed the Sunningdale Agreement and was involved in extra-parliamentary activity against the agreement. However,in 1975,during discussions on the constitutional status of Northern Ireland in the constitutional convention,William Craig suggested the possibility of voluntary power sharing with the nationalist Social Democratic and Labour Party. In consequence the party split,with dissenters forming the United Ulster Unionist Party. Thereafter Vanguard declined and following poor results in the 1977 local government elections,Craig merged the remainder of Vanguard into the UUP in February 1978.
The Northern Ireland Labour Party (NILP) was a political party in Northern Ireland which operated from 1924 until 1987.
Frank McCoubrey is a Northern Irish unionist politician and Ulster Loyalist,as well as a community activist and researcher. McCoubrey is a Belfast City Councillor for the Court DEA since 1997,sitting as a Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) member since 2012. He is a leading member of the Ulster Political Research Group (UPRG). McCoubrey is a native of Highfield,Belfast.
The Loyalist Association of Workers (LAW) was a militant unionist organisation in Northern Ireland that sought to mobilise trade union members in support of the loyalist cause. It became notorious for a one-day strike in 1973 that ended in widespread violence.
Billy "Hutchie" Hutchinson is a Northern Irish Ulster Loyalist politician and activist who served as leader of the Progressive Unionist Party (PUP) from 2011 to 2023,now serving as party president. He was a Belfast City Councillor,representing Oldpark from 1997 to 2005,and then Court from 2014 to 2023. Hutchinson was a Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly (MLA) for Belfast North from 1998 to 2003. Before this,he had been a member of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and was a founder of their youth wing,the Young Citizen Volunteers (YCV).
Rathcoole is a housing estate in Newtownabbey,County Antrim,Northern Ireland. It was built in the 1950s to house many of those displaced by the demolition of inner city housing in Belfast city. Rathcoole is within the wider Antrim and Newtownabbey Borough. Its approximate borders are provided by O'Neill Road on the north,Doagh Road on the east,Shore Road on the south and Church Road and Merville Garden Village on the west.
The Labour Coalition was an electoral coalition in Northern Ireland of socialist and labour groups,formed to stand in the 1996 Northern Ireland Forum elections. It was listed in the enabling legislation simply as "Labour".
John Gregg was a senior member of the UDA/UFF loyalist paramilitary organisation in Northern Ireland. In 1984,Gregg seriously wounded Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams in an assassination attempt. From the 1990s until he was shot dead in 2003 by rival associates,Gregg served as brigadier of the UDA's South East Antrim Brigade. Widely known as a man with a fearsome reputation,Gregg was considered a "hawk" in some loyalist circles.
The Newtownabbey Labour Party is a minor political party based in Newtownabbey,Northern Ireland.
William Alexander Fraser Agnew,known as Fraser Agnew,is a retired Northern Irish unionist politician who was an Antrim and Newtownabbey Councillor for the Three Mile Water DEA from 2014 to 2023. He was previously an Independent Unionist Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) for Belfast North from 1998 to 2003.
William Hull was a loyalist activist in Northern Ireland. Hull was a leading figure in political,paramilitary and trade union circles during the early years of the Troubles. He is most remembered for being the leader of the Loyalist Association of Workers,a loyalist trade union-styled movement that briefly enjoyed a mass membership before fading.
Tommy Kirkham is a Northern Ireland loyalist political figure and former councillor. Beginning his political career with the Democratic Unionist Party,he was then associated with the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) and the Ulster Political Research Group although he has since been expelled from both groups. He was a former deputy mayor of Newtownabbey and sat on Newtownabbey Borough Council as an Independent Loyalist.
The UDA South East Antrim Brigade was previously one of the six brigades of the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) and are heavily involved in the drug trade. It is claimed they control "100%" of an illegal drugs network in south-east County Antrim,Northern Ireland. A mural in support of the group lists its areas of activity as being Rathcoole,Rathfern,Monkstown,Glengormley and Whitewell,all of which are part of Newtownabbey,as well as Carrickfergus,the Shore Road,Greenisland,Ballymena,Whitehead,Antrim and Larne. A newer mural in the Cloughfern area of Newtownabbey and flags have updated the areas to include Ballycarry,Ballyclare,the rural hinterland of Ballymena called 'Braidside' and despite not being in County Antrim,the town of Newtownards. The Guardian has identified it as "one of the most dangerous factions". The Irish News described the brigade as 'powerful' and at one time being 'the most bloody and murderous gang operating within the paramilitary organisation'. Since 2007 the South East Antrim Brigade has operated independently of the UDA following a fall-out.
Joe English is a former Ulster loyalist activist. English was a leading figure in both the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) and the Ulster Democratic Party (UDP) and was instrumental in the early stages of the Northern Ireland peace process. He is a native of the Rathcoole area of Newtownabbey,Northern Ireland. English is a member of the Apprentice Boys of Derry.
David Adams is a Northern Irish loyalist activist and former politician. He was instrumental in bringing about the loyalist ceasefire of 1994 and played a leading role in the early stages of the Northern Ireland peace process.
The Shore Road is a major arterial route and area of housing and commerce that runs through north Belfast and Newtownabbey in Northern Ireland. It forms part of the A2 road,a traffic route which links Belfast to the County Antrim coast.
Thomas English,usually known as Tommy English,was an Ulster loyalist paramilitary and politician. He served as a commander in the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) and was killed by members of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) as part of a violent loyalist feud between the two organisations. English had also been noted as a leading figure in the Ulster Democratic Party (UDP) during the early years of the Northern Ireland peace process.
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John Kenneth Blair is an Alliance Party politician,who has been a Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly (MLA) for South Antrim since 2018. He is the first openly gay member of the Assembly.