William McCrea (politician)

The Reverend Doctor
William McCrea
Member of Parliament
for South Antrim
Incumbent
Assumed office
5 May 2005
Preceded by David Burnside
Majority 1,183 (3.5%)
In office
21 September 2000 – 7 June 2001
Preceded by Clifford Forsythe
Succeeded by David Burnside
Member of Parliament
for Mid Ulster
In office
9 June 1983 – 1 May 1997
Preceded by John Dunlop
Succeeded by Martin McGuinness
Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly
for South Antrim
In office
7 March 2007 – 1 July 2010
Preceded by Wilson Clyde
Succeeded by Paul Girvan
Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly
for Mid-Ulster
In office
25 June 1998 – 7 March 2007
Preceded by Office Created
Succeeded by Ian McCrea
Personal details
Born 6 August 1948
Stewartstown, Northern Ireland
Nationality British
Political party Democratic Unionist Party
Children 5
Alma mater Raveanhill Theological Hall
Profession Clergyman
Religion Free Presbyterian
Website William McCrea

Robert Thomas William McCrea (born 6 August 1948) is a Democratic Unionist Party politician and Free Presbyterian minister from Northern Ireland.[1] He represented Antrim South and Mid Ulster as their Member of Parliament.[2]

Early life and education

McCrea was the youngest of five children born to Robert Thomas (a famer in Stewartstown, Northern Ireland) and Sarah Jayne in August 1948.[3] He was educated in Magherafelt and spent a short time working in Social Security in the Civil Service of Northern Ireland before accepting the call to train as a Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster minister and undertook this training at Ravenhill Theological Hall on the Ravenhill Road in Belfast.

Career

He was a member of Magherafelt District Council from its creation in 1973 until standing down to concentrate on Westminster duties in 2010, and topped the poll in every local government election he contested in the 1973-2005 period.

He ran unsuccessfully in the 1982 Belfast South by-election. He was member of Parliament for Mid Ulster from 1983 but lost this seat to Sinn Féin chief negotiator and current Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness at the 1997 election. He took South Antrim at a by-election in 2000 caused by the death of Ulster Unionist Party MP, Clifford Forsythe, but failed to retain this seat at the 2001 election. In the 2005 election he regained the seat.

From 1998 to 2007 he was a member of the Northern Ireland Assembly for Mid Ulster. He was therefore a political representative for two separate constituencies (Mid Ulster and South Antrim) from 2000 to 2001 and from 2005 to 2007.

At the 2007 election, he was elected as an Assembly Member for South Antrim. He resigned from the Assembly in 2010, following his return to Westminster at the general election of that year.[4]

He is also the minister of Magherafelt Free Presbyterian Church and has made numerous gospel albums.

Controversy and Paramilitary associations

McCrea was a member of the Shankill Defence Association and in 1971 he was convicted of riotous behaviour in Dungiven.[5][6] In 1975 he led a prayer service at the paramilitary funerals of Wesley Somerville and Harris Boyle. The two men were part of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) gang that had carried out the Miami Showband killings and were accidentally blown up when the bomb they had planted in the band's minibus went off prematurely, killing them instantly.[6] He was the target of a parcel bomb to his home on 9 August 1988 when a package sent by the Irish Peoples Liberation Organisation was disarmed. McCrea had become suspicious when he noticed the package had a Dublin postmark.[7]

McCrea was criticised when he shared a platform at a Portadown rally with the senior loyalist paramilitary Billy Wright in September 1996. Wright was a member of the Loyalist Volunteer Force.

Call for British airstrikes against Irish towns and cities

A Northern Ireland Office memo released under the thirty-year rule in December 2014 revealed that McCrea had called for British military aircraft to carry out "strikes against Dundalk, Drogheda, Crossmaglen and Carrickmore" at the DUP's annual conference in April 1986.[8]

Alternative medicine

He is a supporter of homeopathy, having signed several early day motions in support of its continued funding on the National Health Service sponsored by Conservative MP David Tredinnick.[9]

References

  1. ↑ Walker, Stephen. "MPs call on government to secure NI air routes". BBC News. Retrieved 30 August 2012.
  2. ↑ "Profile: William McCrea MP".
  3. ↑ Porter, David; McCrea, William (December 1980). In His Pathway: Story of William McCrea. Lakeland Publishing.
  4. ↑ Girvan makes Stormont return, Newtownabbey Times, 8 July 2010
  5. ↑ Moloney, Ed (2008). Paisley. Poolbeg Press. p. 185. ISBN 978-1-84223-324-5.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Newton Emerson (12 August 2006). "Reg warns of violence". Irish News. Retrieved 25 March 2007.
  7. ↑ Jack Holland & Henry McDonald, INLA - Deadly Divisions, 1994, p. 310
  8. ↑ Adrian Rutherford (29 December 2014). "State papers: DUP MP William McCrea wanted air strikes launched on the Republic in the 1980s". Belfast Telegraph. Retrieved 29 December 2014.
  9. ↑ Tredinnick, David (29 June 2010). "Early Day Motion #284 British Medical Association Motions on Homeopathy".

External links

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by
John Dunlop		 Member of Parliament for Mid Ulster
1983–1997 		Succeeded by
Martin McGuinness
Preceded by
Clifford Forsythe		 Member of Parliament for South Antrim
2000–2001 		Succeeded by
David Burnside
Preceded by
David Burnside		 Member of Parliament for South Antrim
2005–present 		Incumbent
Northern Ireland Assembly
Preceded by
New creation		 MLA for Mid-Ulster
1998 - 2007 		Succeeded by
Ian McCrea
Preceded by
Wilson Clyde		 MLA for Antrim South
2007 - 2010 		Succeeded by
Paul Girvan