occurred at the height of the Drumcree protests, three months after the 1998 "Good Friday" Agreement under which both republican and loyalist paramilitaries committed to permanent ceasefires. The Ulster Volunteer Force petrol bombed a house in a predominantly Protestant area of the town killing three Catholic children, the Quinn brothers. The last major flax-spinning operation in the area, the Balnamore Mill, made its final shipment of linen (to Germany) and closed its doors in 1959. The same year, saw the camera manufacturer K.G. Corfield moved from Wolverhampton to Ballymoney, becoming the only camera manufacturers on the island of Ireland. But this surprise addition to Ballymoney's shrinking indusrial base failed in the face of Japanese and German competition. It ceased production in 1971. A further blow to the local economy was delivered in 1988 by a fire that destroyed the Lovell and Christmas pig processing factory that had employed more than 400 people and processed about 40% of Northern Ireland's pork. 21st century In the 21st century, Ballymoney recovered an ability to attract industrial investment. Examples included a 2015 €6.8 million expansion in the operations of McAuley Engineering, and the announcement in June 2022 of a £9 million expansion of the metal fabricator facility of the U.S. machinery giant Terex. In the 30 years between the 1981 census and the 2011 census, the population of the town almost doubled from 5,679 to 10,393 people. In the broader-than-the-town census area, the population rose from 26,865 in 2001 to 32,505 in 2020. Politics Ballymoney district is part of the Causeway Coast and Glens Borough Council. In 2014, the residents elected 3 Democratic Unionist Party, 2 Ulster Unionist Party, 1 Traditional Unionist Voice and 1 Sinn Féin councillors. It is within the North Antrim constituency which in 2019 returned Ian Paisly Jr, Democratic Unionist, to Westminster, and in 2022 returned to the Northern Ireland Assembly one Ulster Unionist, one Democratic Unionist, one Traditional Unionist Voice, one Sinn Féin and one Alliance member. Demographics On Census day (27 March 2011) there were 10,402 people living in the town of Ballymoney (4,354 households), an increase of 15.3% on the Census 2001 population of 9,021. Of these: 19.75% were aged under 16 years and 16.91% were aged 65 and over; 52.84% of the usually resident population were female and 47.16% were male; 76.23% belong to or were brought up in a 'Protestant and Other Christian (including Christian