The dark shadow we seem to see in the distance is not really a mountain ahead, but the shadow of the mountain behind - a shadow from the past thrown forward into our future. It is a dark sludge of historical sectarianism. We can leave it behind us if we wish.

The basic facts of the situation are known and not open to dispute. Early life and education
Trimble was the son of William and Ivy Trimble and grew up in a lower-middle class Presbyterian home in Bangor on the County Down coast. B).

In 2006 he was made a life peer in the House of Lords and a year later left the UUP to join the Conservative Party. Trimble began his career as a Professor of Law at Queen's University Belfast in the 1970s during which time he began to get involved with the paramilitary-linked Vanguard Progressive Unionist Party. He was elected to the Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention in 1975 and joined the UUP in 1978 after the VPUP disbanded.