Eoghan Harris (Independent)

We have a Press Council and a press ombudsman and between those two bodies any politician here who is worried about himself or herself is well protected from simple lies.

What we are talking about is the constant racket of money making, particularly on the part of the most powerful people in society who are the first up to charge the newspapers with defamation or libel. I have never heard such nonsense and this has been going on for years. The Oireachtas has refused for many years to reform the defamation laws and this refusal is not in the interests of Irish democracy.