Dr. Michael Foley:

I think it would. As appears to be the case at the moment, if there is no way to deal sort of retrospectively with the build-up of major media organisations, any increase in the size is contrary to the public interest. Let me say one thing: I was a journalist for 20 years and have been training and educating young people to become journalists. I think I speak for all of us when I say that we are as aware of what this means to our graduates as to others when we speak about unemployment in the newspaper industry. However, we have a particular role here. We are here to balance, I suppose, what might be a commercial interest with the public interest. It is a complicated process and I see that point. I recall one time when I was very involved in the NUJ. I was on its Irish council and we had to speak to our members in the Sunday Tribunebecause the union opposed the then partial takeover of the Sunday Tribuneby Independent News & Media. Our members there feared for their jobs. There was a tension between what the union nationally believed was right and in the public interest and the individual concerns of our members. All of us here are well aware of issues around jobs and the economy, but that discussion is probably for elsewhere. This is a political forum and the issue is a political one.