Joe Doyle

Joseph Doyle (27 June 1936 – 8 August 2009) was an Irish Fine Gael politician. He served two terms as a deputy for the Dublin South-East constituency. He served variously as a member of Dublin City Council, Dáil Éireann and Seanad Éireann, becoming Lord Mayor of Dublin from 1998 to 1999. Political career Doyle, a former sacristan in the local Roman Catholic church in Donnybrook, was first elected to public office at the 1979 local elections, to represent the Pembroke area for Fine Gael on Dublin City Council. He served continually in City Hall from 1979 until his retirement at the 2004 local elections. Between 1998 and 1999 he served as Lord Mayor of Dublin. He was elected to Dáil Éireann as a Fine Gael Teachta Dála (TD) for Dublin South-East at the November 1982 general election, where his party constituency colleague was party leader (and after the election Taoiseach) Garret FitzGerald. Rebellion on abortion Doyle achieved early party notoriety in 1983, when he was one of eight Fine Gael TDs to defy the party and vote against the Fine Gael–Labour Party coalition's proposed wording to the anti-abortion constitutional amendment. Whereas the government's wording included a negative prohibition, namely that nothing in the constitution should be interpreted as granting a right to abortion, Doyle—along with Alice Glenn and some other colleagues—endorsed the Fianna Fáil alternative wording that granted a "right to life to the unborn, with due regard to the equal right of the mother". Because of the controversial nature of the issue of abortion, and the fact that Fine Gael was split on it, he was not sacked from the party for breaking the party whip.