Mr. Séamus Dooley:

Tongue in cheek, I would be delighted if every journalist had to be a member of the NUJ. We do not believe in the licensing of journalists, as happens in France. It is difficult to define what a journalist is. In some respects everyone is a journalist or a photographer. It is a difficult one. We represent full-time professional journalists, people who make their living as journalists and adhere to the code of conduct. I would be opposed to an academic qualification and some form of a limit on the profession because it is important that there is a diversity of voices. A full-time professional journalist who makes his or her living from journalism is as near as I can go to a definition. I would be very reluctant to have a situation where who is or is not a journalist was prescribed by the law. That might sound like a cop out, but I believe that it would be very dangerous if the State or some other body were to licence who can and cannot be a journalist.

The adherence to the NUJ or Press Council of Ireland code is supposed to meet certain standards. I am against the notion that there is an absolute right to privacy in all circumstances. The NUJ code, and the code of practice of the Press Council of Ireland, envisages that there may be circumstances where privacy can be intruded upon in the public interest. One then has to prove that public interest. Without naming anyone I can think of a very well known situation where a character chased down Westmoreland Street by Charlie Bird was clearly evading a report and was clearly guilty of a form of corruption.

Does a journalist in that situation have a right to confront that person on the street? Does he have to make an appointment? Does a journalist telephone a person, saying that it is believed that the person is guilty of wrongdoing and that he or she wants to talk to the individual about it and could he or she come and see the individual? Journalism does not work that way. Journalists must make an ethical decision that the right to invade privacy is in the public interest. It must be an overriding public interest that one cannot get the information required in any other way. To say that journalists can never invade privacy is to provide a shield that I think has consequences.