Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I add my voice in remembrance of Bobby Aylward and extend my sympathies to Helena and the family. I did not know him very well but the reason I stand here today is because I served on the Committee of Public Accounts with him. As was said already, he was a refreshingly honest voice and a great man for puncturing any sense of pomposity or preciousness.

I also had the privilege of travelling to Tanzania with him. We met the public accounts committee there. He left a lasting impression on me, although I did not know him very well. He had a unique way, as Deputy Catherine Murphy said, of deflating pomposity and getting to the kernel. I have a photograph on my phone of him holding a hurling stick in a convent school in Tanzania. That is my memory of him.

Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam dílis.

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