 He sat in the Irish House of Commons as member for Dublin county in the Parliaments of 1559-1560 and 1568-71, and was Sheriff of County Dublin in 1560.He played a major role in Elizabeth I's second Irish Parliament, especially in the crucial year 1569.He emerged as the effective leader of the Anglo-Irish landowners of the Pale, who were opposed to the Court party which supported to the Lord Deputy of Ireland, Sir Henry Sidney.