Ken Kerr
Ulster loyalist

Kenneth Jason Kerr is a Northern Irish loyalist activist. He was a leading figure within the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) and its political wing, the Ulster Loyalist Democratic Party. He was also central to a series of allegations regarding collusion between the British security forces and loyalist paramilitaries.
Ulster Defence Association
In his youth, Kerr served in the British Army before joining the UDA. He served as Brigadier of the UDA's "Londonderry and North Antrim Brigade", and as such was a member of the movement's Inner Council. In this role he succeeded Andy Robinson, who fled his position in 1986. Like South Belfast brigadier John McMichael, Kerr also became involved in the UDA's political arm, the Ulster Loyalist Democratic Party, and following the killing of McMichael in 1987, Kerr served for a time as chairman of the party. This role was soon filled on a more permanent basis by Ray Smallwoods.
Ulster Democratic Party
In 1989, the Ulster Loyalist Democratic Party contested the local elections and, despite a very low-key campaign, Kerr was elected as their sole representative in Northern Ireland. He was elected to Derry City Council, representing the loyalist Waterside area. He lost the seat at the 1993 election.
“Ken Kerr” enters the record as ulster loyalist. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Kerr, Ulster and loyalist can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6387938. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1986, 1987, 1989 and 1993.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ken Kerr” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.