Mirette Hanley-Corboy: Limerick business woman who shattered the glass ceiling

Born: May 23rd,1930

Died: October 18th, 2022

Mirette Hanley-Corboy, who has died aged 92, was a Limerick-based Irish businesswoman at least a generation in advance of others in breaking through glass ceilings where women were concerned in this country, especially in the very male world of the building industry. In 1981, she became the first-ever woman president of the Construction Industry Federation (CIF). She also succeeded in a wide swathe of public services roles before it was common for women.

Hanley-Corboy was the first chairperson of the board charged with building the University of Limerick (UL) campus and thereafter contributed for a further 22 years as an adviser on the ever-evolving project. She joined the governing body of what was then the National Institute of Further Education (NIHE) Limerick, serving from 1981 until 1987, and again, after it had gained full university status, from 1997 until 2007. A big part of her contributions there was a pioneering project to build student accomadation on the campus. Dr Ed Walsh, the first and founding president of UL, asked her to chair the company set up to deliver it, which she did; despite widespread scepticism, including from other third-level institutions, and the Department of Education. It was such a success that it has been replicated at all other universities in the State.

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Hanley-Corboy brought her mastery of the building regulations applicable to the project, former chancellor of UL, Seán Donlon, told The Irish Times. She had immense experience of the area with the development company Portland Estates, which she had set up with her first husband, Seán Hanley, formerly a civil engineer with Limerick Corporation. The company, which they set up in 1964, developed many housing estates and other general engineering works in the Limerick region.

Throughout her career Hanley-Corboy faced significant prejudice. “Back then, women were always thought of as secretaries and the like... I would give talks trying to encourage the industry to branch out, to have woman representation. And it worked, I think,” she told Construction Magazine in an interview published earlier this year.

When her husband, Seán Hanley, died suddenly in 1973, she took over as managing director of Portland Estates, at a time of economic crisis in the State, which was the result of the oil crisis that followed the Arab-Israeli Yom Kippur war. When Hanley-Corboy went to the banks for support, she was met scepticism. But she not only grasped the reins of the company, she succeeded in ensuring its future, which paved the way for her achievement in 1981 when, after remarrying to Tony Corboy, a director of a wholesalers’ firm, in 1977, she eventually succeeded to the presidency of the CIF.

A trade union representative remarked on her election that she “wouldn’t last three months”. She had a highly successful period in office, representing the CIF at an international conference on housing in Dallas, Texas, and, perhaps more importantly, leading a number of delegations to Brussels and to Strasbourg. She was a forceful advocate of the need for the western Euroroute. Her efforts were finally rewarded by the inclusion of the western Euroroute in the Trans European Road Network proposals in 1993. Hanley-Corboy also served on the president’s committee of the Federation de l’Industrie Européene de la Construction, which has supervised the development of a strong European policy focus in regard to construction.

She was the CIF representative on the Central Review Committee, which advises the Government on development issues, and was, in turn, appointed to the Building Advisory Board, the Enterprise Trust, the National and Economic Forum and the National Roads Authority. In 1994 she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Economic Science by UL.

Deeply committed to her native community, she also served a term as chairperson of the Limerick Youth Services.

Hanley-Corboy was also an ardent supporter of Ireland joining the European Union or European Economic Community as it was then. She became a member of the Irish Council for the European Movement in the 1960s. Her pro-European view was no doubt influenced by her early experience of studying at La Sorbonne University in Paris, which she attended for two years following her secondary education at Laurel Hill FCJ Convent School in Limerick in the late 1940s.

Mirette Hanley-Corboy was one of four daughters of Gerald Fitzgerald, a bank manager, and his wife Eileen, (née Guilty). She is survived by the three children of her first marriage, Nigel, Mirette and Melvyn, her sisters Noelle and Eileen, and her step children by her second marriage, Susan, Tonya and Denise. She was predeceased by her first and second husbands, and by her sister Geraldine.