Pa Daly (Kerry, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thought for a second we were being shut down by a Sinn Féin spokesman when the Order of Business was called but not quite. Those days are gone, although one would not know it from the tenor of some of the questions here this afternoon.

Most politicians have probably been defamed or misquoted, particularly online. I am somewhat encouraged by the responses to some of the questions that were asked perhaps unwisely by some of my colleagues today. It reminds me of the advice that is usually given to young solicitors to not ask a question unless they know what the answer will be. The Government parties may be still set in a 1980s section 31 mindset. In any event, I am somewhat encouraged by the responses that were given by the people here today.

We need effective mechanisms when people feel they have been defamed. That goes for politicians, media people and ordinary citizens, all of whom have taken cases using the libel laws in recent times. We need a system to deliver justice and ensure that free speech is there in an efficient, faster and cheap way for all. We are up for any changes that may be brought in.

On my own background, for a very brief time I studied communications in DCU. Many of my classmates went on to work in media outlets, some of whom were subeditors who were totally cleaned out by the media organisations that felt the need to dispense with their services - to their own detriment. When I was a younger solicitor, I knew many people working in the media. Similar to what Mr. Dave O’Connell said, The Kerryman used to have I think five sports journalists, subeditors and probably six to eight news reporters in the area. It was not Mediahuis at the time, but the organisation that took over got rid of them all, depriving the newspaper of much local knowledge.

I worked as a solicitor for many years and many cases came to my door. Many of them were due to lack of experience in court reporting or similar small-type situations. The local media outlets, including radio, are usually quite quick to deal with any of those cases. However, those other cases are with more national papers. There is a system in place where the amount of damages you can receive if you issue an immediate apology and deal with it in a fair and efficient way, like what we have heard from some of the speakers, takes the heat out of the situation. However, I had experiences of other cases where the amount of compensation was drip-fed, the apology was not on the same page as the original alleged libel and also situations where they just refused to deal with it and cost themselves money in the long term. I also had experiences of people who were deceased and family members contacted us to try to do something to prevent that going in and were given a firm “You can’t libel the dead”, more or less, and “Tough luck”. If they were all as responsible as the attitude given by Mr. O’Connell today, there might not be a need for this.

One or two points were made during the course of the afternoon. An interesting point was made regarding an injuries board and the need for juries. I am not convinced that getting rid of the juries will make cases shorter, deal with cases more efficiently and reduce costs. I am not convinced. The example was given of the Personal Injuries Assessment Board. Cases of libel have a different statute of limitations from many other cases; for example, it is six years for contract, two years for personal injuries but only one year before proceedings must be issued for libel – at least that is what it was up to a few years ago. Juries were abolished in personal injuries cases probably 40 years ago now. Have insurance premiums been reduced as a result? We were told that they would be back then. We were told that when the injuries board would come in, insurance premiums would be reduced, but that has not happened. I accept, however, that there should be a newer, fresher system, but it will take buy-in from all sides.

I have a number of questions and one is on the Press Council. Looking at the statistics on the 260 complaints received, it seems that less than 20% were either decided, complaint resolved by the editor or were ongoing at the end of 2021, which was the last year I was able to find information on. Is the three-month deadline too short? There certainly does not seem to be enough information out there on the workings of the Press Council. What I could see is the number of cases that were instigated by unauthorised third parties against people who were not members of the Press Council. What do the witnesses think about those? If I were advising somebody to take a case knowing they had to have proceedings issued within 12 months, taking three months to go into the Press Council means you are losing valuable time in getting cases off the ground. Like it or not, solicitors will only advise someone to do something if it is the best interest of their client and I do not think there is any getting around that. I am sure Mr. Kealey will agree with me on that point.

My other question is for some of the other organisations. Do the witnesses think that journalists should be indemnified, freelance or otherwise, which would take the heat out of some of the complaints or worries of the journalists in question?