Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)

I am not a member of this committee and am not ordinarily here so I thank the Chair for allowing me to contribute. Dr. Day is from my alma mater and is very welcome. Deputy Willie O'Dea sends an apology as he planned to be here. The witnesses have done a huge body of important work.

I want their opinions on a few issues. One is citizen journalists. It is a term I scoff at as I think people have to go and study to acquire the skills to be a journalist. The witnesses also said that there should not be opinion polling in the week before elections. That is not a bad suggestion. Has this been trialled in any jurisdictions? In election people are politically or personally aligned to candidates but there are also a lot of people who are undecided. In the last week some of them for whatever reason will go on the winning side. It could change mindsets. Pages such as Wikipedia start off with the day a person is born, who they are married to, their children and what their is career is. However, for most public figures, be they involved in politics, entertainment or any other form of public life, there is usually a little column on controversies towards the bottom of the page and they are not always accurate. It is very difficult to get them changed. Have the witnesses considered the issue of defamatory stuff that lingers online and is hard to remove?