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Alan Shatter
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Alan Shatter
Alan Joseph Shatter (born 14 February 1951) is an Irish lawyer, author and former Fine Gael politician who served as Minister for Justice and Equality and Minister for Defence from 2011 to 2014. He was a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin South constituency from 1981 to 2002 and from 2007 to 2016. He left Fine Gael in early 2018 and ran as an independent candidate at the 2024 general election, but was not elected.
His most recent books are Life is a Funny Business (2017), Frenzy and Betrayal: The Anatomy of a Political Assassination (2019) and Cyril's Lottery of Life (2023)
He has had occasional opinion articles published in The Irish Times, the Irish Independent, the Sunday Independent, the Business Post, the Jerusalem Post and the Times of Israel.
He is chairperson of the Inheritance Tax Reform Campaign and of Magen David Adom Ireland.
Born in Dublin to a Jewish family, Shatter is the son of Elaine and Reuben Shatter, an English couple who met by chance when they were both on holiday in Ireland in 1947. He was educated at The High School, Dublin, Trinity College Dublin and the Europa Institute of the University of Amsterdam. In his late teens, he worked for two months in Israel on a kibbutz.
Shatter has lived most of his life in Dublin; he grew up in Rathgar and Rathfarnham and lives now in Ballinteer with his wife, Carol Ann (Danker) Shatter. He has two adult children. With interests in fifteen properties, Shatter had the largest property portfolio of any member of Ireland's cabinet while a cabinet minister (2011–2014).
Shatter was a partner in the Dublin law firm Gallagher Shatter (1977–2011). As a solicitor, he acted as an advocate in many seminal and leading cases in the High Court and Supreme Court. He is the author of one of the major academic works on Irish family law (1977, 1981, 1986 and 1997) which advocated substantial constitutional and family law reform. As a politician, he played a lead role in effecting much of the constitutional and legislative change he advocated. He is a former chairperson of the Free Legal Advice Centres (FLAC), a former chairperson of CARE, an organisation that campaigned for child care and children's legislation reform in the 1970s and a former President of the Irish Council Against Blood Sports. Among his professional affiliations, he is a Fellow of the International Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers.[citation needed]
He is also the author of the satirical book Family Planning Irish Style (1979), and the novel Laura (1989). The former satirised the Health (Family Planning) Act 1979 with cartoons by Chaim Factor, a well-known artist and sculptor.[citation needed] Amongst his targets was a provision which required a medical prescription to purchase condoms with the prescription designating the monthly number of condoms that could be lawfully purchased. Life is a Funny Business (2017) is a memoir of the years before his election to the Dáil and their relationship to later events. Frenzy and Betrayal: The Anatomy of a Political Assassination (2019) is his account of controversies that occurred in the period immediately preceding his resignation from the government in May 2014, and the reports on these events.
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Alan Shatter
Alan Joseph Shatter (born 14 February 1951) is an Irish lawyer, author and former Fine Gael politician who served as Minister for Justice and Equality and Minister for Defence from 2011 to 2014. He was a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin South constituency from 1981 to 2002 and from 2007 to 2016. He left Fine Gael in early 2018 and ran as an independent candidate at the 2024 general election, but was not elected.
His most recent books are Life is a Funny Business (2017), Frenzy and Betrayal: The Anatomy of a Political Assassination (2019) and Cyril's Lottery of Life (2023)
He has had occasional opinion articles published in The Irish Times, the Irish Independent, the Sunday Independent, the Business Post, the Jerusalem Post and the Times of Israel.
He is chairperson of the Inheritance Tax Reform Campaign and of Magen David Adom Ireland.
Born in Dublin to a Jewish family, Shatter is the son of Elaine and Reuben Shatter, an English couple who met by chance when they were both on holiday in Ireland in 1947. He was educated at The High School, Dublin, Trinity College Dublin and the Europa Institute of the University of Amsterdam. In his late teens, he worked for two months in Israel on a kibbutz.
Shatter has lived most of his life in Dublin; he grew up in Rathgar and Rathfarnham and lives now in Ballinteer with his wife, Carol Ann (Danker) Shatter. He has two adult children. With interests in fifteen properties, Shatter had the largest property portfolio of any member of Ireland's cabinet while a cabinet minister (2011–2014).
Shatter was a partner in the Dublin law firm Gallagher Shatter (1977–2011). As a solicitor, he acted as an advocate in many seminal and leading cases in the High Court and Supreme Court. He is the author of one of the major academic works on Irish family law (1977, 1981, 1986 and 1997) which advocated substantial constitutional and family law reform. As a politician, he played a lead role in effecting much of the constitutional and legislative change he advocated. He is a former chairperson of the Free Legal Advice Centres (FLAC), a former chairperson of CARE, an organisation that campaigned for child care and children's legislation reform in the 1970s and a former President of the Irish Council Against Blood Sports. Among his professional affiliations, he is a Fellow of the International Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers.[citation needed]
He is also the author of the satirical book Family Planning Irish Style (1979), and the novel Laura (1989). The former satirised the Health (Family Planning) Act 1979 with cartoons by Chaim Factor, a well-known artist and sculptor.[citation needed] Amongst his targets was a provision which required a medical prescription to purchase condoms with the prescription designating the monthly number of condoms that could be lawfully purchased. Life is a Funny Business (2017) is a memoir of the years before his election to the Dáil and their relationship to later events. Frenzy and Betrayal: The Anatomy of a Political Assassination (2019) is his account of controversies that occurred in the period immediately preceding his resignation from the government in May 2014, and the reports on these events.
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