O’Rourke frank about Yuletide loneliness

THEY might have called it The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Politician.

It isn’t often that our public representatives display such empathy with the masses but, then, former senior government minister Mary O’Rourke is no ordinary politician.

With disarming frankness, she spoke yesterday of her loneliness at Christmas and how she misses, in particular, her husband Enda and her brother Brian Lenihan. Her thoughts will also be of her nephew, former finance minister Brian Lenihan Jr.