Addressing the annual barbecue of Queens University DUP Association in Listullycurran Orange Hall, near Lisburn, he insisted the Province has been transformed but the job now was to go on to the next stage.

“Today our country faces a more positive future than at any other time in its history,” the MP declared.

“I believe this is because of the tough decisions which the DUP has made since taking over the leadership of unionism.

“In the past, this country was racked with violent insurrection – bombs and bullets drove away investors and violence deterred people from wanting to stay here to live, work and raise their families. One person in four in this country was unemployed.

“Northern Ireland is at last moving out of that violent past, which was characterised by stagnation in our economy and into a brighter and more peaceful future.”

Mr Donaldson said there was a confidence that “young people like you will be able to raise your own children in a peaceful and prosperous country”.

The key now, he continued, was to build stable devolution, with a strong economy as the central theme.

“In the past, nearly half of the young people in our Province would go off to university on the mainland and then stay there once they had finished their university degree courses,” he said.

“Our economy was being deprived of many of its brightest and its best.

“I want to see those days being brought to an end. I want to see people from the mainland banging on the door of Northern Ireland looking to get in because it is the very best region of the United Kingdom in which to live.”