'Irish Post' co-founder and former editor dies aged 73

BREANDÁN MAC LUA, who co-founded the Irish Postnewspaper in London in 1970 and edited it for its first 18 years, has died after a short illness, aged 73.

Irish Ambassador to Britain David Cooney said: “Breandán Mac Lua was a massive presence among the Irish in Britain over several decades.

"A writer and journalist of distinction, his greatest and more enduring achievement was the founding of the Irish Post, which, in addition to bringing news from home to the Irish in Britain, reported on the activities of the community itself . . .

“Breandán was a man of great learning, blessed with a razor-sharp intellect which he retained to the end. He will be greatly missed by the Irish in Britain.”

Mac Lua, from Co Clare, began his career in Dublin, where he worked for a number of national newspapers and in 1967 wrote The Steadfast Rule: A History of the GAA Ban. He helped form the Federation of Irish Societies.

Mac Lua played a vital role in bolstering the Irish in Britain at a difficult time, media commentator Raymond Snoddy said: “I think the Irish Post was very important in giving the Irish a voice of their own when they were close to being a persecuted minority.”

In an interview to mark the 30th anniversary of the Irish Post, Mac Lua said: "From the outset, I banned the publishing of the words 'emigrants' and 'exiles' and replaced them with 'the Irish community in Britain'. The phrase soon caught on." Mac Lua's wife Maeve died in 2007. He is survived by two daughters.