Daniel O'Donnell has been awarded an honorary MBE in Queen Elizabeth's New Year Honours list. The award was made for his decades of service to the music industry and charity work. He told RTÉ News that following the Christmas Day announcement of his engagement to be married, it was a double celebration. The singer was one of five Irish people on the New Year Honours list.
Barbara Sweetman Fitzgerald, Director of the Irish Association for Cultural, Economic and Social Affairs, is to receive a CBE. Anne-Marie Hutchinson, a solicitor working in the area of child abductions, has been awarded an OBE.
Fashion designer John Rocha is to receive a CBE for his services to the fashion industry. Niall Fitzgerald, the Sligo-born joint chairman of Unilever, receives a knighthood for services to UK business interests.
Terence Brown from County Down, a Professor of English at Trinity College, is to receive a CMG for services to UK-Irish relations.
