Ellen O'Donoghue
Journalist, author and women's rights activist Nell McCafferty has died at the age of 80.
The Irish Times reports she passed away this morning at a nursing home in Co Donegal.
She was born in Derry in 1944, and went on to co-found the Irish Women's Liberation Movement.
Taoiseach Simon Harris led tributes to McCafferty, saying that she left Ireland "a much better place than she found it, and she played her part with spirit and style.
"Nell was fierce, fearless and fiery. If she was in the room or in the debate, you knew about it.
"Her passion and wrath was not scattergun, it had a laser-like focus on calling out inequality and injustice. She suffered no fools but had a kindness and warmth for many. Her wit and Derry turn of phrase made her impossible to ignore," the Taoiseach said.
"As one of the women who took the train in 1971, she set in train an unstoppable wave for equality and a changing of Ireland for the better. That change has not yet reached its conclusion, but it would be nowhere if it wasn’t for warriors like Nell.
"In an Ireland trying to emerge from the shadows and find who it was, Nell McCafferty was one of the people who knew exactly who she was and wasn’t afraid to enter every battle for gay and women’s rights. We all owe her a great debt for this."
In a piece published in the Irish Times earlier this year to mark McCafferty’s 80th birthday, President Michael D Higgins hailed her “enduring courage” as a writer.
“Those who have had Nell as a friend and an ally are very fortunate in their being given the gift of experiencing humanity in all its possibilities and vulnerabilities, and delivered as she did it with a sense of humour that paid tribute to the authenticity of her Derry upbringing,” he wrote.
Journalist Mary Kenny founded the Irish Women's Liberation Movement with Nell McCafferty and others in 1970.
She told Newstalk Nell's wit would never be forgotten.
"I mean that’s the thing about Nell, she had a modern sense of humour, so even people who were critical of her, perhaps, because she was so upfront, were completely disarmed by her charm and by how funny she could be, you know that very special Derry way, so indeed very, very sad. She had been unwell," Ms Kenny said.
Irish Press Ombudsman, journalist Susan McKay, also paid tribute.
“She was an absolutely wonderful journalist, a really ground-breaking journalist,” Ms McKay told BBC Radio Ulster.
“She changed the way that all of us who came after her wrote journalism and did journalism, because she went straight to people.
“You know, if you look back at journalism before Nell, and indeed before some other brilliant woman of her generation, ordinary people were never asked for their opinion. They were written about by gents who thought that they knew how best to analyse society.
“Nell went straight into working-class places, she talked to people who had experienced real hardships and afflictions in their lives, and she brought their voices alive.
“She was tremendously brave and courageous and she wrote about all of the most important stories of her time."
Labour Party leader Ivana Bacik said she is “deeply saddened”.
She described McCafferty as a “wonderful, fearless and unique feminist icon”.
“It was an honour and a privilege to have known Nell, and to have had such fun with her over the years. Deep sympathies to all her family and friends,” she posted on X.
- Additional reporting PA
For the latest Waterford News and Sport, tune into WLR News on the hour and download the WLR App for news on demand.
