Brigadier Nicholas Orr
Biography
Brigadier Orr is delighted to have arrived in Ottawa as the UK Defence Adviser (DA) in the British High Commission. Having spent time previously in Canada at CFB Gagetown, in the Tactics School (1995-1997), and in CFB Suffield, (2001-2003), arriving as the DA is the highlight of his strong association with Canada. He intends to do what he can to reinforce the strong and historic ties between the Defence Forces, across the spectrum of military capability, so that they remain relevant into the future.
Having commissioned into the 14th/20th King’s Hussars from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in 1985 his early career, primarily at Regimental Duty, including tours in Berlin and the British Army of the Rhine (BAOR) where the MBT was still the ‘King of the Battlefield’. At Regimental Duty he has held all command appointments up to and including Commanding Officer (CO). As CO of The King’s Royal Hussars he deployed with his Regiment twice to Iraq and concurrently trained a squadron to deploy to Afghanistan; he also completed a training season that included a full BATUS package.
His operational tours have included Afghanistan (Op HERRICK), Iraq (Op TELIC and Op GRANBY) and Northern Ireland (Op BANNER). Additionally he completed a Military Training Team task in Zimbabwe for 8 months. His immediate previous appointment was as Deputy Commander of British Forces Cyprus where he was responsible for all the forces within the Sovereign Base Areas supporting critical operational outputs (this included Op SHADER and Op TORAL in additional to communications missions).
At staff he has filled various personnel, training and media related appointments. In particular, he held the post of Brigadier Media and Communications (Army) (BMC(A)) working for CGS for 3 years and before that was the DACOS J9 Media in the Permanent Joint Headquarters (PJHQ) during Op HERRICK and Op ELLAMY. During a stint in the Ministry of Defence (MOD) he helped in the overhaul of the Service Personnel Plan incorporating Sufficient, Capable and Motivated. He attended the first Advanced Command and Staff Course at the newly created UK Joint Command and Staff College in 1998 and where he gained a MA in Defence Technology.
He is married to Emma and they have 5 children who are especially keen to get to Canada for their school/university holidays. He is keen on racquet sports and all things involving the mountains from skiing to walking and climbing. He has a healthy interest in water sports including sailing on both small and larger boats and enjoys shooting, stalking and fishing when he gets the opportunity.
Previous roles in government
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Defence Adviser, Canada