Michael McDowell (Independent)

It was the Minister who introduced the question of insurance companies. He said he wished they would take a different and more robust attitude to claims of this kind. It was not me or any of the other Senators who raised that. He now comes in and says we cannot have a law which is dictated by insurance companies. In defence of saying that seriousness does not apply, he said that perhaps the answer lay with the attitude taken by insurance companies in not defending unserious or minor cases.

I agree with the Minister that online defamation is a huge problem. I want to signal now that the provisions he proposes to introduce later in the Bill on that subject are wholly inadequate. I will be dealing with that at a later stage.