Síle de Valera Dublin, where she qualified as a career guidance teacher. De Valera comes from a famous political family; she is the granddaughter of Éamon de Valera, the founder of Fianna Fáil, former Taoiseach and third President of Ireland. She is a niece of the former TD Vivion de Valera and is a first cousin of Teachta Dála Éamon Ó Cuív. De Valera was first returned to Dáil Éireann in the Fianna Fáil landslide victory at the 1977 general election. She was elected for the Dublin County Mid constituency, which included the Tallaght area of County Dublin, being the youngest TD elected
Éamon de Valera Britain marked the occasion with a dinner in his honour and the toast was 'Anglo-Irish Friendship'. A key message in de Valera's campaign was that Ireland could not join the recently established North Atlantic Treaty Organization as long as Northern Ireland was in British hands; although the coalition government favored alliance with NATO, de Valera's approach won more widespread support and prevented the state from signing onto the treaty. Returning to Ireland, during the Mother and Child Scheme crisis that racked the First Inter-Party Government, de Valera kept a dignified silence as Leader of the Opposition, preferring to stay aloof