Walter Millar

Who is Walter Millar?

Walter Millar is a unionist politician in Northern Ireland.

Millar grew up on a farm in Newmills, County Tyrone. He became the founding secretary of the Newmills Apprentice Boys in 1982. He was elected to Cookstown District Council for the Democratic Unionist Party at the Northern Ireland local elections, 1985, and held his seat in 1989. For part of this period, he served as Vice-Chairman of the council.

Millar resigned from the DUP in the mid-1990s, joining the Ulster Independence Movement. He stood for his new party in Mid Ulster at the 1996 elections to the Northern Ireland Forum, but his list only took 263 votes, and he was not elected. He also failed to be elected from his fourth place on the party's regional list.

Millar was also a leading figure in the Tyrone Orange Order, and rose to become Deputy Grand Master to Joel Patton. Like Patton, he was a leading figure in the Spirit of Drumcree group, and the two were compelled to leave the order in 1998.

Opposing the St Andrews Agreement, Millar joined the UK Unionist Party, and stood in Mid Ulster again at the Northern Ireland Assembly election, 2007. In one of the party's better results, he took 2.7% of the votes cast.