David Norris (Independent)

I welcome the Minister's amendment. All sides of the House fought vigorously on this section because, as originally drafted, it seemed to come dangerously close to meaning "this is true because I say it is true or I think it is the case". By prefacing something with "my opinion", it seemed to mean everything would be all right. I categorised it as the "Joan Rivers defence". At the time, she had advertisements on RTE for her show, which was called "Allegedly". To protect herself, she made a joke out of the issue by prefacing every appalling comment on the stars of the entertainment firmament with the word "allegedly".

Senator Walsh's concern regarding who should be responsible may be addressed by a later amendment if the Minister accepts it. I believe in the timeworn American phrase "the buck stops here". The buck should stop with the editor and proprietor. Amendment No. 39 in my name states: "In the case of a successful defamation action, the Editor and Proprietor of the newspaper which published the defamatory statement shall be liable for damages." This removes the journalist who may be vulnerable from the firing line and places the responsibility where it should be, as the editor is in command of the newspaper, the proprietor profits from it and they have legal staff.

Yesterday, a question was raised during the interview of a newspaper reporter who had been dealing trenchantly with the evidence given by the Taoiseach and the contradiction of that by Mr. Hynes, the former head of the national lottery. When asked whether he had further information, the reporter said that he had, but that his article had been "legalled". Passing articles under the scrutiny of libel lawyers is something that responsible newspapers do routinely.

I sympathise with journalists on this issue because there can be inadvertent libel. I know of one case in which a dear, old friend of mine who is no longer with us made a humorous off-the-cuff remark in a column about a comic. The comic did not have much of a sense of humour and I know the stress and strain caused to my friend as a consequence. It would do no harm to clarify that in terms of these actions, the buck stops with the two principal elements who should be responsible with all of the relevant safeguards, namely, the proprietor and the editor. I do not know whether this would satisfy Senator Walsh's situation.