Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for raising the issues. A strong, vibrant and independent media on all platforms is central to our parliamentary democracy and to freedom of speech. The Future of Media Commission is platform agnostic in that sense. It is not taking a preferential view of one platform over another. It is being asked to look at public service broadcasting into the future and how that should be underpinned, public service media, which are important, how to ensure ring-fenced editorial independence into the future, and financial sustainability, which is in its terms of reference. The Deputy is correct when she says that advertising revenues plummeted when the pandemic hit. Yet, we still depended on all media to be an enormous assistance to society and to the State in the public health messages that emerged during the pandemic, from local radio to print media to television and social media.

There has been very significant innovation in terms of online journals and online media platforms like The Currency, Joe.ie and The Journal, among many others. Therefore, we must look at what the future holds. There is a lot of expertise on the commission.

There is a commitment in the programme for Government to review and reform our defamation laws to ensure a better balance while protecting freedom of speech and access to justice and to cover the points that the Deputy has correctly identified. No one likes the current situation because our defamation laws have a chilling effect on quite a lot of journalism and on democracy itself. A separate look at that would probably be more effective and efficient. The Future of Media Commission has a lot on its plate already. The public service dimension is urgent in terms of the financial underpinning of it. What has been happening over the last number of years is not acceptable and we need to come to a decision, not just at Government level but within the Oireachtas, collectively, on how we financially underpin good public service broadcasting and media. If we believe in it as a core value of democracy then we have to put aside partisan party politics with a view to doing the right thing for the future of our democracy and for future generations. This is particularly important in a world where there are lots of competing demands around media, a lot of generation of false facts, fake and misleading news and utilisation of algorithms to distort public information processes. These practices are very extensive, as recent revelations have shown, and one of the most effective ways to combat it is through a robust, independent, financially sustainable and editorially free media.

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