Tim Collins (British Army Officer) - Post-military Career

Post-military Career

He officially left the army on 5 August 2004.

Collins has been approached by both the Conservative Party and the Ulster Unionist Party to run for Parliament, though has not made any commitment to either party. During the 2005 Ulster Unionist leadership election he was cited by a number of prominent Ulster Unionists as an outside figure who would make a good leader, but Collins declined as he felt he had "no experience of politics."

Collins is a signatory of the founding statement of principles of the Henry Jackson Society, which advocates a pro-active approach to the spread of liberal democracy through the world. He has recently been critical of the Iraq war: "the UK and US pour blood and treasure into overseas campaigns which seem to have no ending and no goal ... Clearly I was naive".

Since leaving the Army, Collins' views on the Iraq conflict and other military issues have been widely sought.

Collins is/was CEO of Private Military Company (PMC) Aegis Defence Services Ltd

In 2007, Collins was host of a three-part documentary called Ships That Changed the World for BBC Northern Ireland.

In December, 2008 – during an interview on the BBC’s Today programme, Collins said that, when he left in 2004, the British Army was already undermanned for existing commitments.

Collins is the Chief Executive Officer of specialist security company, New Century Consulting.

In February 2011 Tim Collins appeared on the BBC news programme Panorama in a special entitled 'Forgotten Heroes'. In the documentary, Collins meets veterans struggling to cope with civilian life and sleeps rough on the streets of Brighton with another former soldier.

In December 2011, it was revealed that Collins was approached to stand as an elected police commissioner for the Conservatives in Kent and originally was standing, however he later dropped out of the race.. Tim regularly does speaking to corporate audiences