{"id":309374,"date":"2026-01-29T07:09:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T07:09:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/309374\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T07:09:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T07:09:07","slug":"former-labour-minister-brian-oshea-remembered-as-committed-teacher-and-politician-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/309374\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Labour minister Brian O\u2019Shea remembered as \u2018committed\u2019 teacher and politician \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former Labour Party<\/a> minister Brian O\u2019Shea has been remembered as a \u201ccommitted\u201d teacher and politician and a \u201cwonderful parliamentarian\u201d.<\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Shea, a TD for Waterford<\/a> for more than 20 years, died aged 81 on Wednesday. <\/p>\n

He was a local politician in Waterford during the 1980s and was elected to the Seanad in 1987.<\/p>\n

He first won election to the D\u00e1il<\/a> in 1989 and held that seat continually until he retired in 2011. <\/p>\n

Labour Party leader Ivana Bacik<\/a> described Mr O\u2019Shea as a \u201ccommitted teacher, politician and loyal servant to the Labour Party over many years.\u201d<\/p>\n

She extended her sympathies to his wife Eileen and their children Christine, Anne, Paddy, Siobh\u00e1n, John and Mary as well as his extended family and friends. <\/p>\n

In the D\u00e1il on Wednesday, Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin also offered his sympathies to O\u2019Shea\u2019s family.<\/p>\n

Mr Martin described O\u2019Shea as \u201ca thorough gentleman and wonderful parliamentarian\u201d who was \u201calways calm and always saw things in perspective\u201d.<\/p>\n

In her tribute, Ms Bacik said Mr O\u2019Shea\u2019s home county was \u201calways foremost in his political thoughts, with a strong focus on job creation, health issues, and regional economic development.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said: \u201cOne of the highlights of his time in national politics was no doubt his service as a Minister of State,\u201d first in the Department of Agriculture from 1993 and later in the Department of Health between 1994 and 1997.<\/p>\n

\u201cBrian\u2019s journey to politics began in his work as an educator and a trade unionist,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

He taught in St Paul\u2019s National School beginning in 1970 and was involved in the Irish National Teachers\u2019 Organisation (INTO). <\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Shea was Labour Party chairman between 2007 and 2012 and Ms Bacik said: \u201cEven in retirement he continued to serve loyally as a party trustee for many years.\u201d<\/p>\n

Opening a book of condolence, the mayor of Waterford City and County, Labour councillor Seamus Ryan, said Mr O\u2019Shea had a \u201cdistinguished political career, serving the people of Waterford with pride, dedication and commitment\u201d. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Not \u2018one iota\u2019 of Coalition\u2019s values compromised in dealings with White House, D\u00e1il hearsOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Labour Party minister Brian O\u2019Shea has been remembered as a \u201ccommitted\u201d teacher and politician and a \u201cwonderful…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":309375,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,4767,18,13,14,6,19,17,9170,9171,11,12,15,16,5,7,8,5049],"class_list":{"0":"post-309374","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-dail-eireann","11":"tag-eire","12":"tag-featured-news","13":"tag-featurednews","14":"tag-headlines","15":"tag-ie","16":"tag-ireland","17":"tag-ivana-bacik","18":"tag-labour-party","19":"tag-latest-news","20":"tag-latestnews","21":"tag-main-news","22":"tag-mainnews","23":"tag-news","24":"tag-top-stories","25":"tag-topstories","26":"tag-waterford"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115977136617728273","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=309374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309374\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/309375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=309374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=309374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=309374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}