The Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) is a unionist political party in Northern Ireland. The party was founded in 1905, emerging from the Irish Unionist Alliance in Ulster. Under Edward Carson, it led unionist opposition to the Irish Home Rule movement. Following the partition of Ireland, it was the governing party of Northern Ireland between 1921 and 1972. It was supported by most unionist voters throughout the conflict known as the Troubles, during which time it was often referred to as the Official Unionist Party (OUP).
James Craig, 1st Viscount CraigavonPC PC (NI) DL, was a leading Irish unionist and a key architect of Northern Ireland as a devolved region within the United Kingdom. During the Home Rule Crisis of 1912-14, he defied the British government in preparing an armed resistance in Ulster to an all-Ireland parliament. He accepted partition as a final settlement, securing the opt out of six Ulster counties from the dominion statehood accorded Ireland under the terms of the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty. From then until his death in 1940, he led the Ulster Unionist Party and served Northern Ireland as its first Prime Minister. He publicly characterised his administration as a "Protestant" counterpart to the "Catholic state" nationalists had established in the south. Craig was created a baronet in 1918 and raised to the Peerage in 1927.
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom,, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland. It was created as a separate legal entity on 3 May 1921, under the Government of Ireland Act 1920. The new autonomous Northern Ireland was formed from six of the nine counties of Ulster: four counties with unionist majorities – Antrim, Armagh, Down, and Londonderry – and two counties with slight Irish nationalist majorities – Fermanagh and Tyrone – in the 1918 General Election. The remaining three Ulster counties with larger nationalist majorities were not included. In large part unionists, at least in the north-east, supported its creation while nationalists were opposed.
The only official flag for Northern Ireland is the Union Jack, the flag of the United Kingdom; there is no official local flag that represents only Northern Ireland. The flying of various flags in Northern Ireland is a significant sectarian issue, with different communities identifying with different flags.
Unionism is a political tradition on the island of Ireland that favours political union with Great Britain and professes loyalty to the British Crown and constitution. As the overwhelming sentiment of Ireland's Protestant minority, following Catholic Emancipation (1829) unionism mobilised to keep Ireland part of the United Kingdom and to defeat the efforts of Irish nationalists to restore a separate Irish parliament. Since Partition (1921), as Ulster Unionism its goal has been to maintain Northern Ireland as part of the United Kingdom and to resist a transfer of sovereignty to an all-Ireland republic. Within the framework of a 1998 peace settlement, unionists in Northern Ireland have had to accommodate Irish nationalists in a devolved government, while continuing to rely on the link with Britain to secure their cultural and economic interests.
The Progressive Unionist Party (PUP) is a minor unionist political party in Northern Ireland. It was formed from the Independent Unionist Group operating in the Shankill area of Belfast, becoming the PUP in 1979. Linked to the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and Red Hand Commando (RHC), for a time it described itself as "the only left of centre unionist party" in Northern Ireland, with its main support base in the loyalist working class communities of Belfast.
The Sunningdale Agreement was an attempt to establish a power-sharing Northern Ireland Executive and a cross-border Council of Ireland. The agreement was signed at Sunningdale Park located in Sunningdale, Berkshire, on 9 December 1973. Unionist opposition, violence and general strike caused the collapse of the agreement in May 1974.
The Ulster Unionist Labour Association was an association of trade unionists founded by Edward Carson in June 1918, aligned with the Ulster Unionists in Ireland. Members were known as Labour Unionists. In Britain, 1918 and 1919 were marked by intense class conflict. This phenomenon spread to Ireland, the whole of which was under British rule at the time. This period also saw a large increase in trade union membership and a series of strikes. These union activities raised fears in a section of the Ulster Unionist leadership, principally Edward Carson and R. Dawson Bates. Carson at this time was president of the British Empire Union, and had been predisposed to amplify the danger of a Bolshevik outbreak in Britain.
William "Bill" Craig was a Northern Irish politician best known for forming the Unionist Vanguard movement.
Reginald Norman Morgan Empey, Baron Empey,, best known as Reg Empey, is a Unionist politician from Northern Ireland, who was the leader of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) from 2005 to 2010. He was the chairman of the Ulster Unionist Party from 2012 to 2019. Empey was also twice Lord Mayor of Belfast and was a Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly (MLA) for East Belfast from 1998 to 2011.
The Northern Ireland flags issue is one that divides the population along sectarian lines. Depending on political allegiance, people identify with differing flags and symbols, some of which have, or have had, official status in Northern Ireland.
The Ulster Progressive Unionist Association or, as it became within two months of its formation in June 1937, the Ulster Progressive Unionist Party (UPUP), was a political group formed to seek greater internal debate within unionism and to secure action on unemployment.
Independent Unionist has been a label sometimes used by candidates in elections in the United Kingdom, indicating a support for British unionism.
Ulster Protestant Action (UPA) was an Ulster loyalist political party and Protestant fundamentalist vigilante group in Northern Ireland that was founded in 1956 and reformed as the Protestant Unionist Party in 1966.
Robert David Stewart Campbell, CBE, usually known as David Campbell, is a politician, farmer and businessman from Northern Ireland. He was a member of the 1996–1998 Northern Ireland Forum, and Chairman of the Ulster Unionist Party from 2005 to 2012.
Sir Richard Dawson Bates, 1st Baronet, known as Dawson Bates, was an Ulster Unionist Party member of the Northern Ireland House of Commons.
Cecil Harvey was a unionist politician in Northern Ireland.
William Dickson, known as Billy Dickson, is a unionist politician in Northern Ireland.
