Loyalism is not a particularly popular creed in Great Britain. Indeed, along with the Welsh and the ginger-haired, it is probably one of the few things that you are still "allowed" to make jokes about. If the popular image of Ulster Unionism is of dour bowler-hatted bigots, the popular image of Ulster Loyalism is of shaven-headed, tattooed violent thugs.

To find that this much-maligned group had a witty, eloquent and thoughtful spokesman was a rare and surprising thing. David Ervine was that man, and at his passing politics in Northern Ireland is the poorer.

Ervine came from a tough East Belfast background. By the age of 19, a friend of his had been killed by the IRA and he joined the UVF. Two years later he was sent to prison. The foundations for a life of violence and incarceration, and possible early death, like so many of his contemporaries, appeared to have been laid.

Yet, his time in prison was the making of him. As the Guardian's obituary tells it:

Prison had a profound effect on Ervine, and he blossomed. Under the tutelage of the veteran loyalist Gusty Spence - serving life for a sectarian murder in 1966 - he picked up the pieces of the education he had abandoned at 14 after a confrontational relationship with teachers at Orangefield boys' secondary school. "David will be led, but he will not be driven," his mother had told them. Ervine quickly achieved his O-levels and commenced an arts and social sciences degree, which he completed after his release from the Maze prison in 1980 - although it was "Spence University" rather than the Open University which formed his views about the futility of politically motivated terrorism and nourished both his peace-making instincts and political ambitions.

Ervine remained dedicated to his Protestant working-class roots and constituents, and opposed a United Ireland, but made himself an articulate spokesman for non-violent political engagement (he was often accused of having "swallowed a dictionary" during his time in prison). As the Guardian put it:

he showed considerable courage by consistently condemning sectarian violence, drug dealing, racketeering, racism and other excesses of the paramilitary legacy....

Ervine's political pilgrimage still put him at risk of assassination - from extremists on both sides - and he was forced to move home several times. But the threats failed to curb his outspokenness. In a recent intervention in the Assembly he broke ranks with the unionist opposition to new regulations outlawing discrimination based on sexual orientation: "Equality is equality is equality," he said. "If we refuse any human being the entitlement to equality, we deny ourselves proper equality. It is either for everyone or for no one."

The story of the Sectarian hard-man who found tolerance, understanding and his voice through the liberalising and civilising power of education seems like the stuff of fiction. But it happened, and is as good an advert as any you will find for what Liberalism is, or should be about - enabling people to live together and reach their full potential.

Our thoughts go to his wife and family.