Ian Paisley

Speaking at Stormont to an invited international audience he said "Today at long last we are starting upon the road — I emphasise starting — which I believe will take us to lasting peace in our province. In 1969 he was jailed along with Ronald Bunting for organising an illegal counter-demonstration against a Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association march in Armagh. Thatcher tells us that the Republic must have some say in our Province.

As the leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) he and Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness were elected First Minister and deputy First Minister respectively on 8 May 2007. In 2005 Paisley's political party became the largest unionist party in Northern Ireland displacing his long-term rivals the Ulster Unionists (UUP) who had dominated unionist politics in Northern Ireland since before the partition of Ireland.