David Kerr is a politician from
Northern IrelandNorthern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
who is the Chairman of the
UKThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
-wide
Third WayThe National Liberal Party – The Third Way is a United Kingdom political party that was formed on 17 March 1990 as The Third Way. In 2006, the Third Way registered the name National Liberal Party – The Third Way with the Electoral Commission....
, a liberal nationalist party which advocates
direct democracyDirect democracy is a form of government in which people vote on policy initiatives directly, as opposed to a representative democracy in which people vote for representatives who then vote on policy initiatives. Direct democracy is classically termed "pure democracy"...
along the lines of
SwitzerlandSwitzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
. He was born in
BelfastBelfast is the capital of and largest city in Northern Ireland. By population, it is the 14th biggest city in the United Kingdom and second biggest on the island of Ireland . It is the seat of the devolved government and legislative Northern Ireland Assembly...
and lives in the city's Shankill Road area.
National Front
Kerr began his political career as a member of the
National FrontThe National Front is a far right, white-only political party whose major political activities took place during the 1970s and 1980s. Its popularity peaked in the 1979 general election, when it received 191,719 votes ....
in 1986, siding with the
Political SoldierPolitical Soldier is a political concept associated with the Third Position. It played a leading role in Britain's National Front from the late 1970s onwards under young radicals Nick Griffin, Patrick Harrington and Derek Holland of the Official National Front...
wing of the party during what was a period of internal division. He was a candidate for the party in
Newtownabbey Borough CouncilNewtownabbey Borough Council is a Local Council in County Antrim in Northern Ireland. Newtownabbey has a population of over 80,000 and is on the north shore of Belfast Lough just immediately north of Belfast. The Borough was founded in 1958 as a result of an Act of Parliament passed in 1957 and...
twice during this period. As an NF member Kerr also chaired the North Belfast Independent Unionist Association, where he first developed his ideas on the independence of the region. As a regular columnist for
Nationalism Today, the
ideologicalAn ideology is a set of ideas that constitutes one's goals, expectations, and actions. An ideology can be thought of as a comprehensive vision, as a way of looking at things , as in common sense and several philosophical tendencies , or a set of ideas proposed by the dominant class of a society to...
journal of the
Official National FrontThe Official National Front was one of two far-right groups to emerge in the United Kingdom in 1986 following a split within the National Front...
, Kerr frequently wrote on the topic of
Ulster nationalismUlster nationalism is the name given to a school of thought in Northern Irish politics that seeks the independence of Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom without becoming part of the Republic of Ireland, thereby becoming an independent sovereign state separate from England, Scotland and Wales...
which became the policy of the ONF in relation to Northern Ireland (in contrast to previous NF policy, which was supportive of
Ulster loyalismUlster loyalism is an ideology that is opposed to a united Ireland. It can mean either support for upholding Northern Ireland's status as a constituent part of the United Kingdom , support for Northern Ireland independence, or support for loyalist paramilitaries...
).
Third Way
Kerr voted with others to disband the NF in 1989. In 1990 he was one of the founder members of
Third Way (UK)The National Liberal Party – The Third Way is a United Kingdom political party that was formed on 17 March 1990 as The Third Way. In 2006, the Third Way registered the name National Liberal Party – The Third Way with the Electoral Commission....
, (which is now a think-tank). He is current party chairman of the offshoot National Liberal Party (NLP). Kerr is also the main force behind the
Ulster Third WayThe Ulster Third Way is the Northern Ireland branch of the Third Way and is organised by David Kerr, who had previously campaigned as an 'independent Unionist' as well as for the British National Front.As well as sharing the Third Way's aims U3W is committed to securing independence...
, which acts as the Northern Ireland arm of the party whilst placing the main emphasis on the independence aspect. In the
United Kingdom general election, 2001The United Kingdom general election, 2001 was held on Thursday 7 June 2001 to elect 659 members to the British House of Commons. It was dubbed "the quiet landslide" by the media, as the Labour Party was re-elected with another landslide result and only suffered a net loss of 6 seats...
Kerr stood in the West Belfast constituency as a Third Way candidate but secured only 116 votes (a 0.3% share). He is also a regular writer for various party publications.
Ulster nationalism
As stated previously, Kerr has long been an advocate of an independent Northern Ireland and to this end he is the editor of
Ulster Nation, the only current publication that advocates this position. In electoral terms, Kerr had also stood as a candidate in the
European elections of 1994The European Parliament Election, 1994 was the fourth European election to be held in the United Kingdom. It was held on 9 June, though, as usual, the ballots were not counted until the evening of 12 June. The electoral system was, for the final European election, First Past the Post in England,...
under the title of 'Independent Ulster'. Somewhat oddly, given the peripheral nature of the independence position, Kerr was one of three candidates advocating this stance (Rev.
Hugh RossHugh Ross is a Presbyterian minister and member of the Orange Order, who was previously the leader of the now defunct Ulster Independence Movement .-UIM leadership:...
and Robert Mooney being the other two) and, as a result, suffered from a split vote to capture only 578 votes in what was a single Province-wide constituency. In the aftermath of this election a general meeting of pro-independence groups and individuals was organised by Rev Ross after overtures were sent out to Kerr, Mooney and the
BallymenaBallymena is a large town in County Antrim, Northern Ireland and the seat of Ballymena Borough Council. Ballymena had a population of 28,717 people in the 2001 Census....
-based Ulster Party. Mooney, who had run as Constitutional Independent Northern Ireland and later formed the short-lived Northern Ireland Party, did not turn up but Kerr and Agnes McLeister of the Ulster Party (another minute group that was also Ballymena-based) agreed to pool resources and join forces with Ross's movement. Kerr went on to appear on the candidate list for the
Ulster Independence MovementThe Ulster Independence Movement was an Ulster nationalist political party founded on 17 November 1988. The group emerged from the Ulster Clubs, after a series of 15 public meetings across Northern Ireland...
in the 1996 Forum election and the 1998 election to the
Northern Ireland AssemblyThe Northern Ireland Assembly is the devolved legislature of Northern Ireland. It has power to legislate in a wide range of areas that are not explicitly reserved to the Parliament of the United Kingdom, and to appoint the Northern Ireland Executive...
, although he was not elected.
Kerr is also the author of a book about one of the pioneers of Ulster nationalism,
W. F. McCoyWilliam Frederick McCoy was an Ulster Unionist member of the Parliament of Northern Ireland for South Tyrone who went on to become an early supporter of Ulster nationalism....
.
2005 general election
Most recently, in the
2005 general electionThe United Kingdom general election of 2005 was held on Thursday, 5 May 2005 to elect 646 members to the British House of Commons. The Labour Party under Tony Blair won its third consecutive victory, but with a majority of 66, reduced from 160....
, Kerr stood in the
East Antrim constituencyEast Antrim is a Parliamentary Constituency in the House of Commons and also an Assembly constituency in the Northern Ireland Assembly. It has voted for Unionist candidates since its re-creation in 1983.-Boundaries:...
as a candidate for the
Vote For Yourself PartyMake Politicians History was a minor United Kingdom political party that advocated the abolition of Parliament in favour of devolution to city-states and decision-making by referendum. Its leader was Ronnie Carroll...
, gaining 147 votes (0.5%). Kerr, who remains a Third Way member despite his candidature, claimed to be standing for the party as he endorsed their support for the use of referendums to decide policy. In a post on the
Slugger O'TooleSlugger O'Toole is a weblog started in June 2002 by political analyst Mick Fealty. It began life as Letter to Slugger O'Toole, focused primarily on news and comment about Northern Ireland...
blog he explained "Rainbow George contacted me and asked me to stand for the Vote For Yourself Rainbow Dream Ticket in a constituency outside Belfast in order to promote the ideas that Third Way and the Rainbow Dream Ticket share - Direct democracy".
Solidarity trade union
David Kerr was elected for a five year period to the National Executive of
Solidarity – The Union for British WorkersSolidarity – The Union for British Workers is a United Kingdom trade union formed in late 2005 that is closely associated with the British National Party and Third Way think tank. It is named after the Polish trade union Solidarność, and its logo also appears to be derived from that of the Polish...
in November 2007 and helped to launch the group in the province over the
TwelfthThe Twelfth is a yearly Protestant celebration held on 12 July. It originated in Ireland during the 18th century. It celebrates the Glorious Revolution and victory of Protestant king William of Orange over Catholic king James II at the Battle of the Boyne...
in 2007.
Miscellaneous
He writes a regular column, 'Kerr's Corner', in the Carrickfergus and North Belfast editions of
The Belfast Biz (formerly "The Wizard"), a local freesheet. He is a keen
cyclistCycling, also called bicycling or biking, is the use of bicycles for transport, recreation, or for sport. Persons engaged in cycling are cyclists or bicyclists...
in his spare time and is described on the Third Way's website as having a strong interest in
environmentalEnvironmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology and social movement regarding concerns for environmental conservation and improvement of the health of the environment, particularly as the measure for this health seeks to incorporate the concerns of non-human elements...
and
housingA house is a building or structure that has the ability to be occupied for dwelling by human beings or other creatures. The term house includes many kinds of different dwellings ranging from rudimentary huts of nomadic tribes to free standing individual structures...
issues.
External links