James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It is an alternative because, at the moment, juries decide both whether a person has been defamed and what award he or she should get. This is only a proposal being floated for the purposes of these deliberations but the change would be that the jury would determine whether defamation had occurred and its role would end there. The judge would then decide what award is appropriate in terms of damages for the defamed person, perhaps in a separate module or perhaps on the same day. All of that could be worked out.