Martin Smyth
| Martin Smyth | |
|---|---|
| Member of Parliament for Belfast South |
|
|
In office 5 March 1982 – 11 April 2005 |
|
| Preceded by | Robert Bradford |
| Succeeded by | Alasdair McDonnell |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
15 June 1931 Belfast, Northern Ireland |
| Nationality | British |
| Political party | Ulster Unionist Party |
| Alma mater | Trinity College, Dublin |
| Profession | Clergyman |
Reverend William Martin Smyth (born 15 June 1931) is a Northern Irish unionist politician, and was Ulster Unionist Party Member of Parliament for Belfast South from 1982 to 2005. He was a Vice-President of the Conservative Monday Club.
He is also an ordained minister of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland and was minister of Raffrey, County Down from 1957 to 1963 and of Alexandra Church, Belfast 1963-1982.
Smyth was brought up in the Donegall Road area of Belfast and attended Methodist College Belfast and Trinity College, Dublin.
Smyth became Grand Master of the Orange Order in 1971, in what was seen at the time as a working-class "grass roots" revolt against the till middle-class leadership of the Order. (He remained Grand Master until 1996). In the 1970s, he was a Deputy Leader of the Vanguard movement which had emerged as a faction within the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP). However, when this faction split from the UUP to form the Vanguard Unionist Progressive Party, Smyth chose to remain with the UUP. His name was linked in the Belfast Telegraph with the UUP candidacy for the Belfast North constituency in 1974. However, he did not stand there, and the following year, he was elected to the Constitutional Convention for Belfast South, polling more than double the electoral quota.
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