Opinion

Daniel McConnell: Non-jury defamation trials are a must for a viable and independent Irish media

The legal sector may resist, but the call to end jury trials for defamation is logical and pragmatic

Monica Leech: a High Court jury had awarded Leech €1.87 million damages, plus costs, in 2009 over articles published in the Evening Herald in 2004. In 2015, the Supreme Court reduced the award on appeal to €1.25 million, plus costs. Picture: Collins Courts

For many years, newspapers in Ireland have operated under the chokehold of some of the most stringent defamation laws anywhere in the western world.

The real and chilling impact of such restrictive laws is that we as journalists are severely hampered in our ability to hold people to account.

In more recent times, the current government has brought forward updated and improved defamation legislation which is aimed at modernising and improving the landscape.

The bill ...