Young Farmers’ Clubs of Ulster president Robin Swann is to be named leader of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) today.

The Antrim man was the only UUP member to submit papers for the leadership of the party.

He will replace outgoing leader Mike Nesbitt, who resigned after a poor result in the recent Assembly elections. The UUP lost six seats and returned 10 MLAs, which moved them from the third-largest to the fourth-largest party in Northern Ireland.

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Swann was president of the Young Farmers' Clubs of Ulster (YFCU) from 2005 to 2007 and was first elected as an MLA in 2011. He was appointed UUP chief whip in 2012 and before politics worked in the petroleum industry.

He is not known to be actively farming, having declared no interests in ownership of farmland or income from farming in the NI Assembly’s Register of Members’ Interests.