John Whelan (Labour)

I could not resist commenting.

I call on the Leader to request at the earliest opportunity the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources to come before the House. I know he has a heavy work schedule and much legislation pending. There has never been a more appropriate time for him to set out his stall and give preliminary notice to the House of his plans for what I believe will be complex legislation on media ownership and control in the country. It is vital that we do so at this juncture, particularly in view of the story doing the rounds at present with regards to phone hacking and the scurrilous and sinister journalistic practices in the UK.

I raise this matter this morning because in the current edition of the Irish Journalist, which is the magazine of the National Union of Journalists, NUJ, the Irish secretary of the NUJ, Séamus Dooley, writes that bosses should not be allowed to control the news. He raises serious matters which would be of concern to Members of the House regarding editorial independence in the national media in particular.

I support his call for the establishment of a media commission to examine all aspects of media ownership and control. To facilitate a consultation process which is as broad as possible, perhaps Members of the House could take part in it and be represented on the commission. Mr. Dooley has also called for members of the NUJ and journalists to live up to the union's proud traditions and high standards of defending editorial independence and genuine journalism free of commercial bias rooted in private agendas.

It is important that the House notes the NUJ, through its Irish secretary, has stated there is now irrefutable evidence that across a broad range of print and broadcast media outlets attempts have been made to shape the coverage and interfere with the reporting of the recent Moriarty tribunal. This would be of grave concern to the House. We all received copies of the three large volumes of the tribunal's report. It does not take too much to consider that in a small country such as ours how a small group of people who are media moguls could stymie the reporting of important matters of public interest. I raise this in light of the shocking revelations regarding the News of the World. It would be naive in the extreme to think it is going on in the UK and not here.