Her route from councillor to lord mayor, TD to leas-cheann comhairle and finally to President, the highest office in the State, gives her a unique, outsider voice. At her inauguration, she passionately vowed to use it to make sure “all are heard and valued”.

She recalled how the change began with a small group facing what appeared to be insurmountable challenges. Many felt it was “too great a leap, that our ideas were too far out, too left, at odds with the prevailing narrative”. But they kept at it and discovered that, “all over the country, however, it became evident that the dominant narrative did not reflect or represent people’s values and concerns”.

The President has set down a marker as an authentic and independent speaker, shorn of institutional echoes. For, she believed: “The pe

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