Jim Allister stood as a TUV candidate in the
2010 Westminster parliamentary election in
the North Antrim constituency. Having polled well in the previous year's European election, Allister stood a chance of winning the seat. This would have been a tremendous loss to the DUP, as it has historically been the party's safest seat and the seat of DUP founder and former party leader
Ian Paisley. He came second in the poll with 7,114 votes to the DUP's
Ian Paisley Jr who polled 19,672 votes. Allister is a vocal critic of the
A5 Western Transport Corridor, and claimed in 2010 a proposed bypass around
Dungiven on the
A6 would destroy some Protestant-owned farms and suggested this was planned "in order to avoid the more direct route which would disrupt the GAA facilities". Allister returned to the
Northern Ireland Assembly at the
2011 election, being the last candidate elected in
North Antrim. In 2012, the year after his return to the Assembly, Allister established at
Parliament Buildings in Belfast an annual event to mark the European Day of Remembrance of Victims of Terrorism – each year on the anniversary of the
Madrid bombings of 11 March 2004, the European Union remembers the victims of terrorist attacks across the world. In August 2012, Allister called the
Parades Commission "little
Hitlers" when they placed restrictions on a loyalist parade. In June 2013, a private member's bill proposed by Allister - the Civil Service (Special Advisers) Bill – was voted into law by the
Northern Ireland Assembly. The bill's aim was to tighten the rules governing appointment of special advisers (SPADS) by ministers of the Northern Ireland government. Amongst other things, the new law debarred anyone convicted of an offence carrying a jail sentence of five years or more from appointment as a SPAD. Allister said that he was inspired to introduce the bill by the example of Ann Travers who had protested against the appointment, in 2011, of former
IRA member Mary McArdle to the position of special adviser by the then
Sinn Féin minister for culture and arts. McArdle had been convicted for her part in the 1972 murder of
Mary Travers and the serious wounding of her father, Tom Travers, a Belfast magistrate. Some years later, Allister recalled: "I labelled it 'Ann's Law' because that's a proper tribute to the driving force behind it. That's probably my proudest moment as a politician … to have left on the statute book the first victory in years for innocent victims." He ran again for Northern Ireland at the
2014 European Parliament election, receiving 75,806 first-preference votes (12.1%), a decrease of 1.6%. At the
2016 Assembly election, Allister topped the poll in North Antrim, and was elected on the seventh count. In November 2016, Allister opposed a motion pardoning gay men convicted for formerly illegal homosexual acts. In February 2021, the Functioning of Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill was passed by a vote in the
Northern Ireland Assembly. Introduced as a private member's bill by Jim Allister, the bill's primary aim was to correct dysfunctional behaviour by ministers, special advisers and civil servants who ran the government of Northern Ireland. The Coghlin Report (March 2020) into the Renewable Heating Incentive scheme scandal had proposed 44 recommendations for improvement in the functioning of the Northern Ireland government and its civil service. The NI Executive and Assembly had responded to this report by creating a new code of conduct to address these failures. But Allister was of the opinion that this was insufficient and that law, rather than guidance, was necessary to remedy the problems identified in the report. The bill he proposed was complex, detailed and led to much debate in the Northern Ireland Assembly but most of its content was eventually approved, with only one of the parties in the assembly objecting to all of its content. As a result of the new law, written records of all governmental meetings were to be taken by civil servants, confidential government business was no longer to be discussed via private email accounts, sharing of confidential information which could be used for private financial gain was to be a criminal offence, ministers and special advisers were to sign a registry of interests which would show whether their personal financial interest overlapped with their elected responsibilities, and the appointment of so-called 'super-spads' by a political party rather than via the normal civil service appointment procedures was prohibited. Finally, the first minister and deputy first minister were to produce a report, every two years, regarding the functional performance of the government, its departments and attached civil service personnel. An August 2021, opinion poll by the polling company LucidTalk found a large rise in support for Allister's party the TUV to 14% of first preference vote intentions in the upcoming
May 2022 Northern Ireland Assembly elections. At the same time, the poll found that 51 per cent of those who responded rated Allister's performance as "bad or awful", compared with "bad or awful" ratings for
Paul Givan,
Jeffrey Donaldson and
Michelle O'Neill of 48, 47 and 45 per cent, respectively. TUV failed to win any new seats in the election, despite increasing their overall vote by 5.0%. Allister was re-elected in North Antrim on the fifth count, polling 8,282 first-preferences (16.4%). Expressing his disappointment during the count, he said: “We have 7.6 percent of the vote, a massive increase, but that is not reflected in the number of seats. It is very disappointing when you collect 4-5,000 votes or more in many other constituencies that it doesn’t translate into seats because of the vagaries of the system.” Allister supports compulsory Christian religious education and worship in schools. ==Member of Parliament==