Heather Humphreys, the first woman ever to be elected to the Cavan-Monaghan constituency, was guaranteed to keep her seat.
Living on a farm in Aghabog, Co Monaghan, the 56-year-old has delivered for a constituency plagued by rural demise and poor infrastructure.
She has been Minister for Business since former tánaiste Frances Fitzgerald resigned in 2018, and previously served as minister for culture when she garnered great praise for her handling of the highly successful and delicately balanced 1916 Rising centenary commemorations.
A no-nonsense pragmatist, her reputation for straight talking cut through Fine Gael’s diffident handling of the fallout from TD Maria Bailey’s personal injuries case over falling from a hotel swing, when the Minister told the Dáil that “people need to have some common sense” and “responsibility for their own personal safety”.
First elected to the Dáil in 2011 when she took over from her fellow Presbyterian Fine Gael colleague Seymour Crawford, she is married with two daughters and previously worked as a manger of Cootehill Credit Union in Co Cavan.
