Press Releases

Address by Dave O’Connell, Group Editor of the Connacht Tribune, at the Press Council’s conference on media coverage of suicide in Portlaoise on December 3rd 2008

PRESS COUNCIL OF IRELAND PORTLAOISE 3 December 2008

THE OFFICE OF CORONER AND THE CORONER’S COURT

A discussion document on issues connected with the reporting of suicide in the press will be the focus of a meeting being organised by the Press Council of Ireland in the Killeshin Hotel, Portlaoise, on Wednesday December 3rd at 8.00 pm.

The launch of a memoir by one of the better known Irish newspaper editors of the twentieth century is,among other things, an occasion to refl ect not only on the past of our newspapers, but on their future.

The role of newspaper coverage in cases of suicide was highlighted at a meeting in Portlaoise on [Wednesday 3rd December] sponsored by the Press Council of Ireland, and which heard contributions from journalists, experts on suicide, and the Minister of State at the Department of Health with responsibility for mental health, Mr. John Molony TD.

“It’s all the politicians’ fault: why don’t they do something.” “It’s all the guards’ fault: they should sort it all out now.” “It’s all the courts’ fault: they should lock them up for life.” “It’s all the media’s fault: if they didn’t glamorize them, these gangs would be seen for the thugs they are.”  

There is only one brief reference to anything relating to crime in the Code of Practice for Newspapers andPeriodicals, which is the gold standard for the operation both of the Press Council of Ireland and of theOffi ce of the Press Ombudsman. However, this is easy to understand. It doesn’t make any more sense toinclude rules for crime reporting in a general code of practice than it would to include rules about fi nancereporting or sports reporting. At the same time, the coverage of crime provokes a debate which has been going on for many years.

The creation of the Press Council of Ireland and the Office of the Press Ombudsman is a development that has, it is true, been some time in coming. And its arrival has not been without controversy. The pressing need to reform our laws on defamation was indeed one of the driving forces behind the initiative taken by the print media generally, almost five years ago now, to explore the possibility of setting up a new regulatory system for themselves. That reform is now in train and, although it has not been finalised, it promises to make some significant changes in our libel laws for the first time in almost half a century. This is no small achievement, and both the present Minister for Justice and his immediate predecessor are entitled to credit for it.

Independent regulation of the print media in Ireland is basically about managing change. In every generation the print media encounters new challenges. The challenge of the current era is that of accountability and transparency.