Helen McEntee

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Helen McEntee
TD
Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People
Assumed office
19 May 2016
Taoiseach Enda Kenny
Preceded by Kathleen Lynch
Teachta Dála
Assumed office
March 2013
Constituency Meath East
Personal details
Born (1986-06-01) 1 June 1986 (age 38)
Castletown, Meath, Ireland
Nationality Irish
Political party Fine Gael
Relations Shane McEntee (father)
Kathleen McEntee (mother)
Gerry McEntee (uncle)
Alma mater Dublin City University
Website https://helenmcenteetd.wordpress.com

Helen McEntee (born June 1986)[1] is an Irish Fine Gael politician, and current Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People in the 30th Government of Ireland. She has been a Teachta Dála (TD) for Meath East since 2013, and is one of three members of Dáil Éireann to represent the constituency.

The daughter of Shane McEntee, himself a Fine Gael politician, and TD from 2005 to 2012, she was raised in Meath and studied at Dublin City University. After taking a job in industry she worked at Leinster House as her father's assistant from 2010, until his death in 2012. She was first elected as a TD at the 2013 Meath East by-election, the election having been triggered by the death of her father, and she became the first Fine Gael candidate to win a by-election with the party in government since 1975. She was re-elected to represent the constituency in 2016, and subsequently appointed as a junior minister of state in the Department of Health.

Early life and career

The daughter of Shane and Kathleen McEntee, Helen McEntee is one of four siblings.[1][2][3] She is also the niece of former Gaelic footballer and prominent surgeon Gerry McEntee.[4] Raised on her family's farm in Castletown, County Meath, she attended St Joseph's Mercy Secondary School in Navan, where she first developed an interest in politics, and represented her class on the school's student council.[4][5][6] From 2004 she studied economics, politics and law at Dublin City University (DCU), where she helped to re-establish the university's branch of Young Fine Gael, which had been inactive for some time before then.[1][7] After graduating in 2007, she worked for a subsidiary of Citibank, but returned to higher education in 2010 to complete a Masters in Journalism and Media Communications at Griffith College.[1][6]

Her father was first elected to Dáil Éireann as a Fine Gael Teachta Dála (TD) at the 2005 Meath by-election, winning the seat vacated by the resignation of former Taoiseach John Bruton, and was a popular figure with constituents.[8] McEntee began to work in Leinster House as her father's personal assistant in May 2010, while he was an opposition TD.[4][8][9] One of the first issues on which she worked with her father was a campaign on behalf of homeowners whose properties had been damaged by the use of pyrite, a material used in the building process of several thousand houses, and which expands when damp or exposed to air.[6] She considered standing as a candidate in the 2014 local elections, and discussed the prospect with her father, as well as the possibility of one day succeeding him as a member of the Dáil. She moved with him to the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine when he was appointed Minister of State after Fine Gael became a party of government following the 2011 general election.[4][7][9][10]

Shane McEntee committed suicide on 21 December 2012, his death triggering a by-election.[1] His brother, Gerry blamed cyberbullying through social media as a contributing factor in his suicide, and opposition politicians who had criticised him for comments he made about grant cuts to respite care.[10] Fine Gael politician John Farrelly also suggested online abuse as a possible cause, but Helen McEntee has rejected this theory, since she had managed her father's social media presence and was not aware of any issues.[1][9][11] Speaking to The Sunday Independent during her campaign to succeed her father as a TD, she said that she did not believe he had intended to kill himself, and that she did not think he was depressed.[12] Later in 2013 she joined the launch of a suicide prevention campaign by the Pieta House charity, aimed at educating rural communities about the early warning signs of suicide.[13] She also took part in a sponsored walk from Dublin to Navan for the See the Light campaign, which seeks to raise awareness of mental health issues.[9]

Political career

2013 Meath East by-election, and 31st Dáil

McEntee was selected to stand as the Fine Gael candidate in the Meath East by-election during a party convention held at the Headfort Arms Hotel in Kells on 7 March 2013. She was the only nominee whose name went forward to contest the seat for Fine Gael, and the only woman among eleven candidates in the by-election itself.[1][14] During her campaign, McEntee expressed her wish to continue her father's work, while seeking to be "a young fresh voice", and focused on issues such as emigration, employment, and supporting local business.[4] She was joined on the campaign trail by Taoiseach Enda Kenny, who was confronted at a supermarket in Ratoath by an officer of the Garda Siochana angered at having to accept a pay cut because of austerity measures introduced by the government.[15] McEntee participated in a televised debate on RTÉ One's Primetime on 25 March, along with Fianna Fáil candidate Thomas Byrne, Labour’s Eoin Holmes and Sinn Féin’s Darren O’Rourke.[16]

She was subsequently elected to Dáil Eireann in the by-election held on 27 March, defeating Byrne (previously a TD for the constituency) with 9,356 first preference votes compared to 8,002 for Byrne.[17][18] In retaining the seat for Fine Gael she became the first candidate to win a by-election for the party while in government since Taoiseach Kenny succeeded his father as a TD in 1975.[19] McEntee became the second youngest TD (after Simon Harris) and the youngest female TD in the 31st Dáil.[1][20] During the election campaign, Seamus Morris, a Sinn Féin councillor in North Tipperary, accused the McEntee family of putting their grief to one side to keep their "snouts in the trough".[21][22] Morris posted the comments on Facebook, but later withdrew them when they were published on the front page of the Irish Daily Mail, and issued an apology; Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams called the remarks "entirely inappropriate".[21][22]

McEntee took her seat in the Dáil on 16 April 2013, where she received a standing ovation upon entering the debating chamber, and was welcomed by Taoiseach Kenny, as well as other political leaders.[23] She described taking up the seat vacated by her father as "a huge honour", and said that it was an "emotional day for all the McEntee family".[24] The Irish Independent later reported that she had "impressed many...[by her] manner and choice of words to the media as she arrived at Leinster House. 'I drove down to the graveside this morning and had a few words. I think he [her father] called into Michael Collins the morning of his first day, so I called into my hero.'"[25] McEntee gave her maiden speech to the Dáil on 8 May 2013, during a debate about that year's fodder crisis, praising Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney's handling of the issue.[26][27] She was subsequently appointed to the Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications, and the Oireachtas Committee on Environment, Culture and the Gaeltacht.[28]

She spent much of her first term focusing on constituency issues,[29] among them championing the 2013 Pyrite Resolution Act, a €50m compensation scheme for homes affected by the use of pyrite in their construction. She also secured funding for the Slane bypass, as well as increased funding for schools and local community sports projects. In addition, McEntee campaigned for improvements to mobile broadband coverage in Meath, and was a vocal supporter of the local agricultural industry. She campaigned for a yes vote in the 2015 referendum concerning the legalisation of same-sex marriage in the Republic of Ireland, and voted in favour of the proposed abolition of Seanad Éireann, the upper house of the Irish parliament.[1][5][9][30] McEntee has expressed concern that the area around the Newgrange monument, which is in her constituency, risks becoming a "dead zone" due to restricted planning regulations in the vicinity which often prevents the building of new homes and facilities.[31] Following a random audit of 22 members of the Oireachtas in 2014, she was one of five politicians required to repay expenses they had claimed and that had been declared ineligible. She described the episode, which resulted in her having to repay £1,675.88 of expenses, as being a result of "human error".[29][32]

2016 general election, and 32nd Dáil

McEntee contested the Meath East constituency in the 2016 general election, where she was one of two sitting Fine Gael deputies defending Dáil seats.[33][34] Elaine Loughlin of the Irish Examiner noted that despite her relatively short time representing the constituency, McEntee had been "visible on the ground, attending community meetings and events", and suggested she would benefit from this at the forthcoming poll, particularly as she had enjoyed a greater presence than her colleagues. Newstalk presenter Ivan Yates forecast a win for Fianna Fáil in an area that falls into the Dublin commuter belt, but felt that McEntee would hold on to her seat because she is from the largely rural north of the constituency.[35][36]

McEntee was re-elected to represent Meath East at the election, held on 26 February.[37] Under the Irish electoral system, which uses the single transferable vote (STV) she was one of three candidates elected to represent the constituency, alongside Thomas Byrne for Fianna Fail and Regina Doherty for Fine Gael. With 7,556 votes McEntee finished second behind Byrne, who had 10,818 votes. She secured a seat in the Dáil on the eighth count, despite not reaching the 50% quota required under STV rules.[37]

In the aftermath of an election that had produced no overall winner, and as Fine Gael parliamentary party secretary, McEntee voiced her support for a proposed Fine Gael–Fianna Fáil coalition, which had been put forward by Kenny and other senior party figures. The move was backed by Fine Gael's backbench TDs at a meeting on 7 April, but rejected by Fianna Fáil. McEntee described the proposal as "an historic offer, representing seismic change in the political landscape".[38][39] She also participated in an internal party inquiry into Fine Gael's poor election performance, as part of a team of TDs who spoke to unsuccessful candidates, but stood down from this position upon her appointment as a junior minister.[40]

Kenny formed a minority government after securing the support of several Independent TDs,[41] and on 19 May 2016 appointed McEntee as Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People. She was one of eighteen deputies to take up junior ministerial roles in the government of the 32nd Dáil, and one of four women to hold office as a junior minister.[42][43] Responding to the announcement McEntee said she was delighted to be appointed a junior minister.[41]

References

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External links

Oireachtas
Preceded by Fine Gael Teachta Dála for Meath East
2013–present		 Incumbent
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