Mary O'Rourke

Mary O'Rourke (birth name: Mary Lenihan ; Irish : Máire Uí Ruairc ; born May 31, 1937 in Athlone , County Westmeath ) is a former Irish politician of the Fianna Fáil .

biography

Mary Lenihan comes from a politically active family. Her father Patrick Lenihan was a Member of the House of Commons, her brother Brian was a minister in the Fianna Fáil governments for two decades, his son Brian Joseph being finance minister until 2011, while another son, Conor , was minister of state with different responsibilities until 2011 .

She herself worked as a teacher after completing her studies and began her national political career in 1981 with the election to the Senate ( Seanad Éireann ), in which she represented the culture and education group until 1982.

On November 24, 1982 she was elected as a candidate of Fianna Fáil for the first time to MP ( Teachta Dála ) of the House of Commons ( Dáil Éireann ) and represented there until 1992, first the constituency of Longford-Westmeath and then until 2002 the constituency of Westmeath .

After the Fianna Fáil's election victory, she was appointed Minister of Education in his cabinet on March 10, 1987 by Prime Minister ( Taoiseach ) Charles J. Haughey . She held this office until a cabinet reshuffle on November 14, 1991, when she was appointed Minister of Health.

In 1992 she ran for the office of chairman of Fianna Fáil . However, she was clearly defeated by six votes to Albert Reynolds (61 votes) and Michael Woods (ten votes).

Haughey's successor as Prime Minister, Albert Reynolds, appointed her Minister of State in the Department of Industry and Commerce on February 13, 1992 . As a "junior minister", she no longer belonged to the actual cabinet. She was then Minister of State from January 14, 1993 to December 15, 1994 in the Ministry of Enterprise and Employment.

After the Fianna Fáil won again, she was appointed Minister for Public Enterprises on June 26, 1997 by Prime Minister Bertie Ahern . She held this office until June 6, 2002.

After leaving the Cabinet and the House of Commons, she was nominated by Prime Minister Ahern on July 26, 2002 as a member of the Senate and was there from September 2002 to 2007 leader of the government group ( Leader of the Seanad Éireann ).

From 2007 to February 2011 O'Rourke again represented the Longford-Westmeath constituency in the House of Commons.

She won an Irish Book Award in 2012 for her autobiography Just Mary: My Memoir .

Web links

• Homepage of the Oireachtas
• Irish Ministeries (rulers.org)