Defamation (Amendment) Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages Seanad Éireann — 2026-01-21 ============================================================ Gerard P. Craughwell (IND), Labour Panel As the Senator has said, my concern is when we enter litigation, we never know the outcome. The serious damage that may not be envisaged by this legislation may actually occur not immediately after the court case, but some time into the future and it is very hard to imagine where that is so. It would be up to the lawyers on behalf of a corporate body to try to ensure any long-term effect to the institution be taken care of in any litigation which takes place. That is just my layman's view on it. My colleague, Senator McDowell, and the Minister, Deputy O'Callaghan, are lawyers and would have a better grip on that but that is my view on it as it stands. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-01-21/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:31+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-01-21