Peter Mathews

Who is Peter Mathews?

Peter Mathews is an Irish politician. He was elected as a Teachta Dála for the Dublin South constituency at the 2011 general election. He sits as an independent TD, having lost the Fine Gael parliamentary party whip in July 2013. He left the Fine Gael party in October 2013.

He has been a panelist on Tonight with Vincent Browne during the Irish financial crisis.

Mathews attended Gonzaga College and went on to study Commerce at University College Dublin. He is married to Susan and they have four children. Mathews joined the Progressive Democrats on its foundation but left shortly afterwards.

He is a qualified Chartered Accountant, and has worked for Coopers & Lybrand and ICC Bank. Before entering politics, he was a consultant on banking and finance, and a media commentator.

On 14 March 2012, the Government was defeated in a vote taken at a meeting of the Oireachtas finance committee after numerous Fine Gael TDs went missing. The motion, tabled by Mathews who was then forced to vote against it following threats from his colleagues, proposed that Central Bank Governor Patrick Honohan be forced to appear before the Oireachtas finance committee by the end of the month.