William Alexander Fraser Agnew, known as Fraser Agnew, is a retired Northern Irish unionist politician who was an Antrim and Newtownabbey Councillor for the Three Mile Water DEA from

2014 The year 2014 was marked by the surge of the Western African Ebola epidemic, West African Ebola epidemic, which began in 2013, becoming the List of Ebola outbreaks, most widespread outbreak of the Ebola, Ebola virus in human history, resul ...

2023 Catastrophic natural disasters in 2023 included the Lists of 21st-century earthquakes, 5th-deadliest earthquake of the 21st century 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquakes, striking Turkey and Syria, leaving up to 62,000 people dead; Cyclone Freddy ...

. He was previously an

Independent Unionist Independent Unionist is a label sometimes used by candidates in British elections to indicate their support for British unionism. It is most popularly associated with candidates in elections for the Parliament of Northern Ireland. Such candi ...

Member of the Legislative Assembly A Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) is a representative elected to sit in a legislative assembly. The term most commonly refers to members of the legislature of a federated state or an autonomous region, but is also used for several nation ...

(MLA) for Belfast North from 1998 to 2003.

Career

After growing up in

Ballyclare Ballyclare () is a small town in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It had a population of 10,850 according to the 2021 United Kingdom census, 2021 census, and is located within the Antrim and Newtownabbey Borough Council area. It is part of, and ...

, Agnew studied at the

University of Ulster Ulster University (; Ulster Scots: or ), legally the University of Ulster, is a multi-campus public research university located in Northern Ireland. It is often referred to informally and unofficially as Ulster, or by the abbreviation UU. It i ...

Jordanstown Jordanstown () is a townland (of 964 acres) and electoral ward in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It is within the urban area of Newtownabbey and the Antrim and Newtownabbey Borough Council area. It is also situated in the civil parish of Car ...

, Belfast Technical College and the College of Business Studies. He worked as a writer and

architectural Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and construction, constructi ...

draughtsperson, and was elected to

Newtownabbey Borough Council Newtownabbey Borough Council was a Local Authority in County Antrim in Northern Ireland, on the north shore of Belfast Lough just immediately north of Belfast. The Council merged with Antrim Borough Council in April 2015 under local governmen ...

as 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) representative for the Newtownabbey Area B District in

1981 Events January * January 1 ** Greece enters the European Economic Community, predecessor of the European Union. ** Palau becomes a self-governing territory. * January 6 – A funeral service is held in West Germany for Nazi Grand Admiral ...

. Agnew was also elected to the

Northern Ireland Assembly The Northern Ireland Assembly (; ), often referred to by the metonym ''Stormont'', is the devolved unicameral legislature of Northern Ireland. It has power to legislate in a wide range of areas that are not explicitly reserved to the Parliam ...

in the 1982 election, as a Member for South Antrim. In the

1985 Northern Ireland local elections Elections for local government were held in Northern Ireland on 15 May 1985, contesting 565 seats in all. Background 1981 elections The previous elections had been fought in the middle of the hunger strike and the H-Block Prison Protest. Th ...

, Agnew was re-elected onto Newtownabbey Council as a member of the newly created Doagh Road District. In 1990, Agnew served as the Mayor of Newtownabbey. In the early 1990s, he left the UUP and was later re-elected in

1993 The United Nations General Assembly, General Assembly of the United Nations designated 1993 as: * International Year for the World's Indigenous People The year 1993 in the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands had only 364 days, since its ...

as an

independent Unionist Independent Unionist is a label sometimes used by candidates in British elections to indicate their support for British unionism. It is most popularly associated with candidates in elections for the Parliament of Northern Ireland. Such candi ...

for the

University A university () is an educational institution, institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly ...

District. In 1996, standing for the 'Independent Templeton' ticket, he was an unsuccessful candidate in the

Northern Ireland Forum The Northern Ireland Forum for Political Dialogue was a body set up in 1996 as part of a process of negotiations that eventually led to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. The forum was elected, with five members being elected for each List o ...

election in South Antrim. He was elected as an independent in the

1998 Northern Ireland Assembly election The 1998 Northern Ireland Assembly election took place on Thursday, 25 June 1998. This was the first election to the new devolved Northern Ireland Assembly. Six members from each of Northern Ireland's eighteen House of Commons of the United Kin ...

, representing North Belfast, when he formed the

United Unionist Coalition The United Unionist Coalition (UUC), formerly known as the United Unionist Assembly Party, was a minor unionist political formation in Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland Assembly The UUC was formed by three members of the Northern Ireland Ass ...

(UUC) with other anti-

Good Friday Agreement The Good Friday Agreement (GFA) or Belfast Agreement ( or ; or ) is a pair of agreements signed on 10 April (Good Friday) 1998 that ended most of the violence of the Troubles, an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland since the la ...

unionists. All three members of the UUC, including Agnew, lost their seats at the 2003 Assembly election. He held his council seat for the UUC in 2005. In March 2007, he was awarded the Freedom of the Borough of

Newtownabbey Newtownabbey ( ) is a large settlement north of Belfast city centre in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It is separated from the rest of the city by Cavehill and Fortwilliam golf course, but it still forms part of the Belfast metropolitan area ...

. In January 2011, he rejoined the UUP.Agnew comes home to UUP
", Ulster Unionist Party, 28 January 2011 Tom Elliot, leader of the UUP had this to say regarding his decision: "I strongly believe that voters across the province will return, like Fraser, to their natural Ulster Unionist home and I am looking forward to making sure that the UUP becomes the party of choice for all shades of progressive Unionist opinion." Agnew was elected onto the newly formed

Antrim and Newtownabbey Borough Council Antrim and Newtownabbey Borough Council is a local authority that was established on 1 April 2015. It replaces Antrim Borough Council and Newtownabbey Borough Council. A statutory transition committee was established in 2013 to prepare for the m ...

in the 2014 local elections, as a councillor for the Three Mile Water District. He was re-elected in

2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...

, before retiring at the 2023 local elections.

References

;Sources
The Northern Ireland Assembly
{{DEFAULTSORT:Agnew, Fraser 20th-century births Year of birth missing (living people) Living people People from Ballyclare Members of Newtownabbey Borough Council Mayors of Newtownabbey Northern Ireland MPAs 1982–1986 Northern Ireland MLAs 1998–2003 Independent members of the Northern Ireland Assembly Ulster Unionist Party councillors