Mr. Rory Montgomery:

The constitution of the Press Council states essentially that any publication that circulates in Ireland or a part of it is entitled to be a member. There is a procedure whereby periodicals or publications can apply. There are various criteria, which are examined. We ask whether they can pay the entrance fee and the annual subscription, but do we know who the owners are and is there evidence they are actually publishing? It is obviously a two-way street. The vast majority of publications are members of the Press Council. It is a quality mark and at the same time, it imposes obligations. As the Senator said, there is a code of 11 principles, including the one he cited. If a publication is believed by a member of the public or representative group to have breached one of those principles, a complaint can be made to the Press Council. If such a publication were not a member of the Press Council, there would be no avenue for them to be pursued. I do not want to get into individual cases. It is not for the Press Council itself to scrutinise how its member publications are performing. We depend on there being complaints.

There are disciplinary procedures within the Press Council that can result in the expulsion of members. Fortunately, that has never had to be done and I hope it never will be. Another fundamental point, as we mentioned earlier, is that not only do publications have to respond to complaints but they also have to publish our decisions, no matter how much they dislike what is being said. Until now at least, there has never been a case where a member publication has not printed an apology or correction, which is a positive thing. I do not want to speculate about the conditions where, as Mr. Dooley said, the kind of contract between the Press Council and publications would break down. Of course, as the media landscape becomes ever more diverse, it is something we have to keep in the back of our minds.