Thomas Byrne is a veteran of Irish politics. Elected deputy for the first time in 2007, he has been in the Government for five years, having held the European Affairs portfolios (2020-22); Education, Tourism, Culture, Arts, Irish Language, Sport and Media (2022-25); and Defense and European Affairs since the beginning of this year.
Graduated in Law, Byrne is a member of the liberal Fianna Fáil party. As part of his current duties, he came to Lisbon to meet with several politicians and spoke to Expresso on an afternoon of heavy rain.
What brings you to Portugal?
The weather… today is very similar to Ireland. And it is true that we are very close, not only geographically, but in terms of values and perspectives. We cooperate a lot with Portugal at the level of the European Union and the United Nations and, of course, Ireland assumes the presidency of the Council of the European Union in the second half of next year. I am, therefore, visiting all Member States, as far as possible. I am very happy to be here and speak with my counterpart, Secretary of State Inês Domingos, and with the members of the parliamentary committee on European Affairs.