Daire Brehan

Education

Trinity College.

Career

Prior to her broadcasting career, she worked as an actress on stage and television in Ireland. Following a scholarship to the Contemporary Theatre of Wroclaw in Poland, she returned to Ireland in 1985 and co-founded, with director Maciek Bernatt-Reszczynski, the theatre company Theatre Unlimited, acting in many productions which included work inspired by modern Eastern European theatre and the Irish cultural tradition. Her broadcasting work began with Raidió Teilifís Éireann Radio 1, for whom she presented programmes including Sounding Out and Brehan’s Law, the latter drawing on her earlier legal training.

As an undergraduate in the 1970s at Trinity College Dublin her law tutors included Mary McAleese who went on to become president of Ireland, and former Irish President and United Nations Commissioner, Mary Robinson.

Moving on from British Broadcasting Corporation Radio 4 in the late 1990s, she returned to the law to convert her Irish law degree to meet United Kingdom requirements and was called to the Bar in July 2002 under her birth name Daire Brennan-Holahan, subsequently practising in criminal defence and prosecution. As a prosecutor she appeared on behalf of the National Probation Service and Local Authorities in prosecutions in the Crown Court, and as a defence barrister she represented clients on a wide array of charges.

In 2005 she was called to the Bar of the Republic of Ireland. From April 2007, while continuing to work as a consultant trainer to the legal profession, she also worked as a qualified Pilates Instructor and holistic massage therapist.

Achievements

• She was a member of the Inner Temple and also the founder and Honorary Secretary of the Inner Temple Residents" Association, and in 2012 was elected a Bencher of the Honourable Society of the Inner Temple.