Junior minister with responsibility for sport, physical activity and the Gaeltacht, Thomas Byrne, will return to the Dáil for a fourth time after retaining his seat in the 2024 election.

Mr Byrne (47) was first elected as a TD in 2007, but lost his seat in the 2011 election.

He spent five years in the Seanad, elected to the cultural and educational panel, and served as Seanad spokesman on public expenditure and financial sector reform and later as health spokesman. He returned to the Dáil in 2016.

Fluent in Irish, he took on the role of Gaeltacht Minister in April, after responsibility for the ministry was transferred back to Fianna Fáil in April 2024.

A resident of Colpe, Co Meath, Byrne was educated at St Mary’s Diocesan School, Drogheda, and Trinity College Dublin, where he studied law and subsequently worked as a solicitor. He is also a qualified attorney at law in New York.