Barry Andrews (born 16 May 1967) is a former Irish Fianna Fáil politician. He was a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dún Laoghaire constituency from 2002 to 2011.^[1] He served as the Minister of State for Children from May 2008 to March 2011.

Early and personal life

He was born in Dublin and was educated at Blackrock College and University College Dublin, where he received a Masters Degree in Modern History. He worked as a secondary school teacher from 1991 until 1997, when he entered King's Inns and qualified as a barrister. Andrews was first elected to public office in June 1999, when he was elected to Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council. His brother David McSavage is a comedian and his first cousin is Irish television and radio presenter Ryan Tubridy.

Political career

He was elected to Dáil Éireann at the 2002 general election. Andrews comes from a family with strong political connections. His grandfather, Todd Andrews fought in the War of Independence and became a founder-member of Fianna Fáil, while his grandmother, Mary Coyle, was a member of Cumann na mBan.

Andrews's father, David Andrews served as a TD from 1965 to 2002 and is a former Foreign Minister, while his uncle, Niall Andrews, was a former Fianna Fáil TD and MEP and his cousin Chris Andrews (son of Niall Andrews), is a former TD.

In June 2006, Andrews led a group of Fianna Fáil backbenchers in an unsuccessful attempt to establish a backbench committee to influence Government Policy. At the 2007 general election, Andrews retained his seat in Dún Laoghaire with 8,587 votes.^[2]

On 31 January 2011 Andrews was named Health spokesman by party leader, Michael Martin ^[3]

He lost his seat at the 2011 general election.^[2] After eight years service Andrews is entitled to a lump sum of €110,000 and a pension of €31,000.^[4]

Murphy Report

After the release of the Murphy Report into child abuse in the Dublin diocese in November 2009. Minister Andrews, speaking at a conference in Dublin Castle, said it would be "amazing" if there were no consequences for people who were the subject of adverse findings in the report. Asked about the position of Bishop of Limerick Donal Murray, the Minister said:

The Taoiseach obviously last week in response to the Murphy commission indicated that it wasn't for the Government to decide on the ecumenical appointments one way or the other . . . Nevertheless, I think it's everybody's view that if adverse findings are made against an individual in a commission of inquiry then it would be amazing that there be no consequences for them.^[5]

Clearly pressure had been exerted from within the church on Bishop Murray, it would appear, and those consequences may come to pass. Obviously we don't know exactly the nature of that... [I] would be very concerned if the entire response in terms of our own public debate on the entire Murphy commission is about an individual appointment or otherwise where we continue to have a serious child sexual abuse problem in this country and even in the past clerical child sexual abuse was a fraction of what was going on and it is unfortunate that where we have an opportunity to think about how do we improve things in the future that we would be concentrating on something that quite frankly is very much a part of it, albeit not a great part of it in my view.

He said he was also disappointed at the absence of a response from Rome. Minister Andrews added that:

Naturally we would expect there to be some reflections from Rome on what it means for the delivery of safe practices for children in this country in terms of the Catholic Church and how they are as patrons of our national schools and how they are going to provide us with the reassurance that they have and will comply with best practice in child protection in the future.^[5]

See also

• Families in the Oireachtas

References