Professor Oonagh Breen appointed to The Law Reform Commission
In September 2025, Professor Oonagh Breen was appointed to the role of part-time commissioner with the Law Reform Commission. Her appointment is designed to strengthen the Commission’s capacity to deliver on its work keeping the law under review and making recommendations for reform.
Professor Breen is a qualified barrister and a renowned expert in regulation and governance, with a particular focus on the legal regulation of charities.
She holds a BCL and LLM from University College Dublin (UCD), an LLM and JSD from Yale Law School, and teaches NGO law and governance and equity and the law of trusts at UCD Sutherland School of Law.
In 2021, she was appointed chair of the independent review of charity regulation in Northern Ireland. In November 2025 she was also appointed to the Charities Regulator's Consultative Panel, joining ten others appointed to the panel on the Advancement of Human Rights as a Charitable Purpose.
Professor Breen is the co-editor of several significant publications, including Regulatory Waves: Comparative Perspectives on State Regulation and Self-Regulation Policies in the Nonprofit Sector (2017) and co-author of Law of Charities in Ireland (2019).
She has held both Fulbright and Government of Ireland research fellowships.