Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)

First, I will deal with Deputy Carthy's point about time or costs. The point I make is that if a case takes longer, it will cost more. Individuals will have to pay more for a case if it goes for six days rather than four days. The two extra days will add extra cost to it.

Both colleagues referred to the Higgins decision. It was an important Supreme Court decision that set out the bands that should be awarded for defamation awards. The Higgins decision will still apply whether there is a jury or not. When it comes to the award of damages, a High Court judge sitting on his or her own, hearing a defamation action today, must apply the parameters of the Higgins judgment. The benefit of the Higgins case is not going to be lost, but it is not the sole reason for the abolition of juries. The main reason advanced is in order to ensure that the process is expedited, resulting in a reduction in costs.

Deputy Carthy referred to the fact that there would probably be more appeals. He is correct that a jury determination is generally more sacrosanct and hard to overturn than the finding of a judge. One of the deficiencies that exists in respect of the area of defamation that will be improved should it be determined by judges is that we do not have any reported first-instance decisions on defamation cases in the High Court. We seldom get that because what happens here, as happened in the case of the former leader of Deputy Carthy's party, is that we just get a result from a jury that the plaintiff succeeds and the damages are a sum of money. Whereas if we have a decision of a judge, we get an explanation as to why the plaintiff was defamed, the defences that were put forward and why they have or have not succeeded, and a justification for the award of damages coming within the Higgins parameters.

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