Gary Middleton (born 20 June 1990) is a Unionist politician from

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ; ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, part of the United Kingdom in the north-east of the island of Ireland. It has been #Descriptions, variously described as a country, province or region. Northern Ireland shares Repub ...

representing the

Democratic Unionist Party The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) is a Unionism in Ireland, unionist, Ulster loyalism, loyalist, British nationalist and national conservative political party in Northern Ireland. It was founded in 1971 during the Troubles by Ian Paisley, who ...

(DUP). He has been a member of 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 ...

(MLA) for Foyle since 2015. Middleton is the DUP Spokesperson for the North West. He served as Acting Junior Minister for the Executive Office from February to March 2021 while Gordon Lyons was Acting Agriculture Minister while Edwin Poots stood aside due to ill health. In June 2021, Middleton replaced Lyons permanently as Junior Minister.

Early life

Born in Newbuildings,

County Londonderry County Londonderry (Ulster Scots dialects, Ulster-Scots: ''Coontie Lunnonderrie''), also known as County Derry (), is one of the six Counties of Northern Ireland, counties of Northern Ireland, one of the thirty-two Counties of Ireland, count ...

, Middleton studied Computer Science 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 ...

, and also obtained a diploma in Civic Leadership and Community Planning from the same institution. Prior to becoming an MLA, he was a youth worker and also worked as an assistant to Foyle MLA William Hay and later Maurice Devenney, who was himself co-opted to replace William Hay in October 2014 upon the latter's retirement after being elevated to the

House of Lords The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the lower house, the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. One of the oldest ext ...

Electoral history

Middleton was first elected to Derry City Council in 2011 at the age of 20, replacing William Hay by

co-option Co-option, also known as co-optation and sometimes spelt cooption or cooptation, is a term with three common meanings. It may refer to: 1) The process of adding members to an elite Social group, group at the discretion of members of the body, us ...

. He also served as Deputy Mayor from June 2013 – March 2015. In 2014 he was elected to the new Derry and Strabane ' super council' and was appointed group leader of the DUP councillors. In April 2015, he was co-opted to replace fellow DUP member Maurice Devenney in the

, becoming the assembly's youngest member at 24. Shortly after joining the assembly, it was announced that Middleton would be the DUP's candidate for the Foyle constituency in the

United Kingdom general election United Kingdom general elections (elections for the House of Commons) have occurred in the United Kingdom since the first in 1802. The members of the 1801–1802 Parliament had been elected to the former Parliament of Great Britain and Parliame ...

, eventually finishing a distant third with 12.4% of the vote.

References

External links

DUP profileNI Assembly profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Middleton, Gary 1990 births Living people Democratic Unionist Party MLAs Councillors in Derry (city) Northern Ireland MLAs 2011–2016 Northern Ireland MLAs 2016–2017 Northern Ireland MLAs 2017–2022 People from County Londonderry Democratic Unionist Party parliamentary candidates