The National Union of Journalists has expressed "grave concern" over the Law Reform Commission's report on privacy and surveillance, saying it would further restrict media freedom in the State.
The union particularly criticised the commission's rejection of the proposal that the media could regulate themselves on the invasion of privacy through surveillance.
The commission report, published yesterday, states that self-regulation by the media would not give individuals adequate protection against invasion of privacy. Citizens must be given legally-enforceable rights in this area and this could only be done through legislation.
The commission published the heads of a Bill which it believes would protect individuals from privacy-invading surveillance. It rejects the idea that the media, through a voluntary body such as a press council dealing with complaints under a voluntary code of practice, would adequately police this area.
The report says the media may well be in conflict with those complaining of intrusion into privacy. "We cannot agree that the interested parties who would normally be defendants to a court action should instead be allowed to judge for themselves what are a complainant's legitimate expectations of privacy, whether these have been infringed and whether there is a countervailing justification for the infringement based on the `public interest'."
The commission says it is not opposed in principle to effective schemes of self-regulation and welcomes the introduction of voluntary codes of practice in the mass media. It notes as part of this trend the establishment of the Broadcasting Complaints Commission and the Code of Practice on Privacy adopted by the National Newspapers of Ireland last year.
The NUJ's Irish secretary, Mr Eoin Ronayne, said yesterday that by dismissing the proposal for a self-regulating council involving the press and public representatives, the commission had ignored the experience of many countries where press councils and similar bodies provided a healthy antidote to media misbehaviour.
He also criticised the proposal to enable courts to meet in private and to give preventive injunctions to complainants. "By advocating preventive injunctions in advance of publication, it goes further. This proposal would enable wrongdoers to at least delay and maybe to prevent exposure."
The Bill proposed by the Law Reform Commission would leave media outlets open to criminal prosecution and civil action should they publish photographs or information received as a result of surveillance which invaded the privacy of an individual. The law would also make it an offence for Irish or foreign-owned media to publish in Ireland information or images obtained through such surveillance abroad.
Media prosecuted or sued could, however, defend their publication on the grounds that it was justified by "overriding considerations of the public interest".
While proposing leaving media open to prosecution or civil suit, the commission gives examples of public-interest considerations which could be used by the media in their defence. These include the detection or prevention of serious crime, the exposure of illegality or wrongdoing, the need to inform the public on a matter of public importance or to show that a holder of public office is acting contrary to his or her public utterances on matters to that public office.
The commission recognises that Irish media generally take a restrained approach to privacy invasion through surveillance. However, it says some foreign media imports threaten to undermine this approach.
The commission singles out "low-priced tabloid newspapers from the United Kingdom" as posing a particular problem. "There arises the temptation, so far generally resisted in the Irish media, to follow the example of sensationalist and privacy-insensitive foreign media imports in order to match circulation. This temptation is likely to grow and not diminish as the penetration of foreign media into Ireland increases."
It accepts that there has been a low level of official complaints about invasions of privacy in Ireland, especially as a result of surveillance. However, the availability and the use of sophisticated surveillance technology show that it would be "extremely naive to conclude otherwise than that there is a real threat to the human right of privacy in this country".