Minister does not want to 'muzzle media'

Minister for Justice Michael McDowell told the Dáil he was open to a discussion about the "exact sequencing" of defamation and privacy legislation but he insisted that doing nothing about privacy was no longer a "sustainable option".

Mr McDowell said that "I do not want to muzzle the media in any way", but "we have to protect people's rights without unduly affecting the rights of the media to cover matters of public importance". It was difficult to achieve a balance between privacy rights and those of the media, but "it seems to me that doing nothing is no longer a sustainable option, under European Convention law".

He added that "rather than arguing about points of abstract principle" they should "proceed with the day-to-day nitty-gritty of putting in place protections for ordinary people in their dealings with the press. The press council may go a long way to achieving that end."

Fine Gael's justice spokesman Jim O'Keeffe, who raised the issue, claimed that the Privacy Bill, currently before the Seanad, "will cripple investigative journalist and gag the media, while doing nothing to protect the public". During justice questions, Mr O'Keeffe pointed out that privacy rights were "already protected under the Constitution".

He asked if the Minister accepted "that there has been a recognition of the right to privacy not only by the Supreme Court, but also under this country's general jurisprudence since the cases of Geraldine Kennedy, Bruce Arnold and others?"

The right to privacy was further reinforced through Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which had been incorporated into domestic law, he said. The proper approach would be to change the defamation law, establish a press council and press ombudsman.

"We should not rush to make changes in an area in which there appears to be no urgent need for change other than a certain anti-media approach on the part of some people."

The Minister accepted there was a constitutional right of privacy, but victims of invasion of privacy had no legal guarantees if they took a case. When Mr O'Keeffe also questioned the Minister's "Pauline conversion" to privacy legislation, Mr McDowell said that following the privacy case involving Princess Caroline of Monaco, "there is now a clear statement that any old set of privacy laws will not do".

Following the Wainright case in Britain which went to the European Court of Human Rights, there was now an onus on individual states to "provide for an actionable right of invasion of privacy in their legal systems. It is not enough to say that a mishmash or other rights will do."