Ex-soldier Andy Allen vows to support moves towards equality in only part of UK where same-sex couples cannot marry

A former soldier who lost both his legs and most of his sight in a Taliban bomb attack in Afghanistan has pledged that if re-elected to the Northern Ireland assembly he will support moves towards same-sex marriage equality.

Andy Allen is the sole Ulster Unionist outgoing assembly member who has fully backed gay marriage being legalised in the province.



Northern Ireland is the only part of the UK where LGBT couples cannot be married in law, mainly due to the opposition of the Democratic Unionist party (DUP) and a large number of Allen’s party colleagues.



In his East Belfast constituency advice centre, close to a “peace wall” separating the loyalist Cluan Place from the republican Short Strand district, the former Royal Irish Ranger said he came to support same-sex marriage after engaging with the local LGBT community.



“I was elected to the last assembly only in May and I was the only mainstream unionist to vote for same-sex marriage. Whenever I realised it was coming forward I spent a great deal of time talking to people on both sides of the argument, including the gay community.

“I reached out to individuals from that community as well as religious organisations and faiths who robustly argued against it. But I found myself coming to a view of ‘live and let live’.”



Allen can recall with clarity the day his life changed when he walked into an IED (improvised explosive device) set by the Taliban. He was caught in a “daisy chain” of IEDs that resulted in him losing both legs and 70% of his sight, and suffering massive blood loss that almost claimed his life.

“If it wasn’t for two fellow soldiers who administered first aid there and then, risking their lives walking into the area where IEDs were laid, I would never have made it back to Camp Bastion and been operated on. One was my mate Foxy from Northern Ireland, the other was a lad from the Irish Republic. To both of them I owe my life,” Allen said.



The former soldier is expected to be re-elected in the new five-seat East Belfast constituency, with the DUP likely to lose one of its three seats won in the area last May.



In the Sinn Féin heartland of West Belfast, meanwhile, the party’s citadel was breached last May when a leftwing socialist candidate topped the poll with more than 8,000 votes.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest Gerry Carroll at his People Before Profit party’s manifesto launch for the forthcoming assembly election. Photograph: Michael McHugh/PA

Gerry Carroll stood for People Before Profit (PBP), a leftist party with its roots in the Socialist Workers party in Britain. The 39-year-old, who hails from the Andersonstown district of West Belfast, described PBP’s growing presence in the constituency as a “major challenge to Sinn Féin’s domination of the area”.



This time around Carroll is taking something of a risk by fielding a second candidate, Michael Collins, on the PBP ticket. He hopes he can bring Collins in for a second seat with his surplus of votes and some vote-transfer management.



“One of our local bookies has me odds-on to top the poll again so Michael is an outside shot for a second seat. The response we are getting on the ground is great. People are saying that while the DUP was in charge of the RHI [renewable heat incentive] scheme that cost half a billion pounds to the public, Sinn Féin were still in government and were too late to stop the DUP ploughing ahead with this botched scheme.

“The main reaction is: ‘Don’t let the big parties off the hook.’ There is anger towards the DUP, yes, but also Sinn Féin.”



Carroll pointed out that alongside the DUP, Sinn Féin supports the lowering of corporation tax for Northern Ireland specifically to 12.5% – the rate used across the border in the Irish Republic to woo foreign multinationals such as Apple, Google and Microsoft.

“That is certainly not a socialist position because that only benefits large multinational capitalist corporations and it reduces tax intake that should have been spent on schools, hospitals, public services here in Northern Ireland,” he said.

The PBP assembly member pointed out that Donald Trump once attended a Sinn Féin fundraising dinner in the mid-90s and the party’s leader, Gerry Adams, is going to the White House for the St Patrick’s Day celebrations hosted by the US president.

“Sinn Féin activists on the ground join anti-Trump protests, they say Trump is repulsive and vile, but their leader is going to be shaking hands with Trump on 17 March when Enda Kenny [the Irish prime minister] hands over the bowl of shamrock to Trump.”