Defamation (Amendment) Bill 2024: From the Seanad Dail Éireann — 2026-02-11 ============================================================ Jim O'Callaghan (FF), Dublin Bay South I thank my three colleagues for their contributions. I also thank them for their support regarding the amendments that have been brought here from the Seanad. All three spoke about juries. I will deal with that matter presently. Before I do, I would not like people to think that the primary functions of this Bill are all to do with the abolition of High Court juries. There is much more to the Bill than that, as I am sure colleagues are aware. There are two areas that deserve recognition and attention. I will mention them briefly. They are the amendment to section 26 and the provision of a new defence for retailers. Third is the provision to enable someone to go to the Circuit Court to get an identification order against a social media company that has published information about them that is defamatory but where the identity of the person is hidden. These are significant developments that will assist individuals who have been defamed and who want to get access to the identity of those who have defamed them. Most defamation that takes place in Ireland, as I am sure my friends would agree, happens online by unidentified persons who defame people by means of social media platforms. At present, in order to establish the identity of the defamer, you have to go to the High Court to get a Norwich Pharmacal order to get the social media company to identify the person behind it. As a result of the provision being introduced here, there will now be a straightforward statutory procedure that will enable people to go before the Circuit Court. I think all colleagues will welcome that. --- 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/dail/2026-02-11/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:02+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-02-11