It was not possible to say when proposals would be brought to Government for defamation legislation, said Mr Joe Jacob, Minister of State for Public Enterprise. He said a Defamation Bill was included in the Government's legislation programme.
Mr Jacob, speaking for the Minister for Justice, was responding to a Green Party call for the introduction of such legislation for greater press freedom.
Mr John Gormley (Green, Dublin South East) said that before the revelations by the political lobbyist, Mr Frank Dunlop, a number of people had been sued for libel or threatened when they alleged impropriety in county council planning decisions.
He said the media had an important role to play in maintaining a functioning democracy. They were not wholly responsible for exposing the corruption, and great credit had to go to Michael Smith and Mr Mac Eochaidh who placed an advertisement, through Newry solicitors, seeking to expose planning corruption.
Stories by Frank McDonald and Mark Brennock, "who were the first to allude to the brown paper bag that is now part of public mythology", also played an important role.
He believed that greater media freedom should also include greater responsibility and accountability and this could be done through the legislation, compelling apologies and retractions of the same prominence where a story was wrong.
