John Esmond Birnie (born 6 January 1965) is a British economist, author and former unionist politician. He was an

Ulster Unionist Party The Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) is a Unionism in Ireland, unionist political party in Northern Ireland. The party was founded as the Ulster Unionist Council in 1905, emerging from the Irish Unionist Alliance in Ulster. Under Edward Carson, it l ...

(UUP)

Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs; ; ) are representatives elected by the voters to the Northern Ireland Assembly. About The Northern Ireland Assembly has 90 elected members – five from each of 18 constituencies, the boundaries o ...

(MLA) for Belfast South from 1998 until 2007.

Background

Birnie was born in

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

, Scotland. He attended Ballymena Primary School and later

Ballymena Academy Ballymena Academy is a mixed gender, voluntary Grammar schools in the United Kingdom, grammar school in the market town of Ballymena in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It was founded in 1828 as a small provincial school for children in the tow ...

. He studied Economics at

Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge Gonville and Caius College, commonly known as Caius ( ), is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1348 by Edmund Gonville, it is the fourth-oldest of the University of Cambridge's 31 colleges and ...

before completing a PhD at Queen’s University Belfast. He was an unsuccessful Conservative Party candidate in the elections to

Belfast City Council Belfast City Council () is the Local government in Northern Ireland, local authority with responsibility for part of Belfast, the largest city of Northern Ireland. The council serves an estimated population of (), the largest of any district c ...

for Balmoral in the 1993 Northern Ireland Local Election. In the 2005 Northern Ireland Local Election, he stood again for Balmoral, this time for the Ulster Unionist Party, and failed to get elected by 0.95 votes on the final count. Birnie was also second on the Conservative regional list for the 1996 Forum Election, but was not elected as the party was 12th most popular in electoral support, and only the top 10 parties were eligible for two top up seats. He was elected to the Northern Ireland Assembly in 1998. During the Assembly he was Chairman of the Assembly's Employment and Learning Committee. He retained his seat in 2003 but lost it in the 2007 elections. He was then employed as a special advisor to Employment and Learning Minister, Sir Reg Empey. He is now Chief Economist for

PricewaterhouseCoopers PricewaterhouseCoopers, also known as PwC, is a multinational professional services network based in London, United Kingdom. It is the second-largest professional services network in the world and is one of the Big Four accounting firms, alon ...

in Northern Ireland.

Works

* * ''Firm, Competitiveness and Environmental Regulations: A Study of the European Food Processing Industries'' by David Hitchens, Esmond Birnie, Angela McGowan, and Ursula Triebswetter (Hardcover - 28 October 1998) * ''The Northern Ireland Economy: Performance, Prospects and Policy'' by Esmond Birnie and D.M.W.N. Hitchens (Hardcover - 23 February 1999) * ''Environmental Regulation and Competitive Advantage: A Study of Packaging Waste in the European Supply Chain'' by David Hitchens, Esmond Birnie, William Thompson, and Ursula Triebswetter (Hardcover - 29 March 2000)

References

External links

NI Assembly profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Birnie, Esmond 1965 births Alumni of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge Alumni of Queen's University Belfast British economists Living people Northern Ireland MLAs 1998–2003 Northern Ireland MLAs 2003–2007 Ulster Unionist Party MLAs Politicians from Edinburgh Academics of Queen's University Belfast Academics from Edinburgh People educated at Ballymena Academy