Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation Bill 2026: Second Stage Dail Éireann — 2026-09-29 ============================================================ Catherine Callaghan (FG), Carlow-Kilkenny I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation Bill 2026. At first glance, the Title of this Bill probably does not tell most people very much about what it actually does, but the principle behind it is relatively straightforward. People should be able to participate in public debate, report on matters of public interest, raise legitimate concerns and ask difficult questions without the legal system being used as a means of silencing them. At the same time, people have a right to their good name and reputation and if somebody has genuinely been wronged, they must continue to have access to the courts. That balance is important and it is worth keeping it at the centre of our consideration of this Bill. What we are dealing with here are commonly called SLAPPs, strategic lawsuits against public participation. We are essentially talking about legal proceedings which can be used against somebody because their participation is a matter of public interest. The concern is not simply whether somebody ultimately wins or loses a particular case. The concern is that the legal process itself can become the punishment. A person may face the prospect of significant legal costs, considerable time, uncertainty and the pressure that comes with defending legal proceedings. There can be a wider effect as well. Other people looking at what has happened may decide that they are better off saying nothing. That is where this becomes an issue not just for the individual involved but for public participation more generally. This issue has been recognised at European level already. In April 2024, the EU adopted its anti-SLAPP directive, which requires member states to provide minimum procedural safeguards for people targeted by manifestly unfounded claims or abusive court proceedings arising from their participation in matters of public interest. This Bill gives further effect to that directive in Irish law. Importantly, Ireland is proposing to go beyond the minimum requirements of the directive in one significant respect. The European requirements relate principally to cases with a cross-border dimension. This Bill proposes that the protections should apply to domestic proceedings in Ireland. This makes sense. If we accept the principle that the legal system should not be abused in order to suppress legitimate public participation, it would be difficult to justify protecting someone where a case has a cross-border element but not providing comparable protection where the entire case arises within Ireland. We have also done some work in this area through the Defamation (Amendment) Act 2026. That legislation contains protections relating to SLAPPs in defamation proceedings. The Bill essentially completes that work by dealing with other civil and commercial proceedings and completing Ireland's transposition of the EU directive. What will actually change? There are a number of practical measures in the Bill, which I think are worth explaining. A defendant who believes that a claim brought against them because of their public participation is manifestly unfounded will be able to apply to have that claim struck out. Importantly, the legislation states that a court should deal with such an application as expeditiously as possible, consistent with the proper administration of justice. Once that application has been made it is for the plaintiff to substantiate the claim so that the court can assess whether it is manifestly unfounded. This matters because one of the problems we are trying to address is the burden that lengthy litigation itself can impose. If a case really is manifestly unfounded, then we should have a mechanism through which that can be identified at an early stage, rather than requiring somebody to go through a prolonged legal process before reaching that conclusion. There are also provisions concerning security for costs and damages. Where a defendant can establish a prima facie case that proceedings are abusive, a court can, where it is in the interests of justice, require the plaintiff to provide security. There are safeguards built into that decision. The court has to consider matters, including the financial circumstances of both parties, whether requiring security would unfairly prejudice the plaintiff's ability to pursue a legitimate claim, and the effect of the defendant's ability to defend the proceedings if security is not provided. Again, this brings us back to balance. We want to protect people against abusive litigation but we cannot replace one barrier to justice with another. A person who has a genuine legal grievance should not be prevented from pursuing it simply because they do not have substantial financial resources. I will be particularly interested in examining this when we get to Committee Stage. There is another interesting provision in the Bill which allows a person or organisation with a legitimate interest in safeguarding public participation to make submissions to the court and, with the court's permission, assist the defendant. That does not extend to funding the proceedings but it recognises that some cases have implications which go beyond the two individual parties before the court. The Bill also provides for the publication, where practicable, of judgments or court orders where a court has found that proceedings were abusive proceedings against public participation. This provides an additional degree of transparency around the operation of this legislation. There are also provisions dealing with proceedings taken outside of Ireland and with certain judgments from third countries. This is important because public debate today does not stop at national borders. Journalism does not stop at national borders and information certainly does not stop at national borders, so our legislation has to recognise the international environment in which people now communicate and publish. There is a broader point here too. When we talk about public participation we should not think only about national newspapers or prominent journalists. Of course, investigative journalism is an important part of this debate and journalists must be able to investigate and report responsibly on matters of genuine public interest. However, public participation is wider than journalism. It can be a community organisation raising an issue. It can be an NGO. It can be somebody involved in environmental or human rights work. It can simply be an individual who has legitimate information or concerns that he or she believes should be put out into the public domain. Our democracy depends upon people being prepared to participate but rights come with responsibilities. Freedom of expression does not mean that somebody can say absolutely anything about another person without consequence. The right to participate in public debate does not remove another person's right to his or her reputation or to seek redress when he or she has genuinely been wronged. We should be careful not to create the impression that every legal action taken against a journalist, campaigner or public participant is automatically a SLAPP. It is not. There will be legitimate cases, disputes, and circumstances where somebody has every right to ask a court to vindicate his or her rights. The role of this legislation is to help the courts distinguish between those genuine cases and proceedings which are manifestly unfounded or abusive. That distinction is fundamental. We also need to be conscious of access to justice on both sides. We quite rightly talk about the cost of somebody having to defend him or herself against abusive proceedings but access to justice also matters for someone who has suffered a genuine wrong and needs the court to remedy it. As this Bill progresses, I will be interested in whether we have got that balance right in practice. Can a manifestly unfounded case be dealt with early enough to make these protections meaningful? Are the tests clear enough for the courts to apply consistently? Are we ensuring that legitimate plaintiffs are not discouraged from accessing courts? Are the remedies sufficiently practical to make a real difference to someone who has been subjected to abusive proceedings? Those are exactly the kind of questions that Committee Stage allows us to examine in greater detail. I also welcome the fact this Bill does not simply focus on one particular profession or category of person: the principle is broader. It is about protecting participation in matters of public interest. That is the correct approach. There is a tendency sometimes when we debate legislation to present competing rights as though one must choose one and disregard the other but I do not think we need to do that here. We can support freedom of expression and public participation while also protecting a person's good name. We can protect journalists and ordinary citizens from abusive litigation while maintaining access to the courts for people with genuine claims. We can give judges stronger and clearer tools to deal with abuse of the legal process while maintaining the independence of the courts to decide individual cases on their merits. That ultimately is the balance this legislation has to achieve. I support the objective of the Bill on Second Stage. The principle behind it is sound. Nobody should be able to use their financial strength or the prospect of lengthy and expensive litigation simply to prevent another person from participating legitimately in a matter of public interest. Equally, nobody should lose their right to vindicate their reputation or other legal rights simply because the person on the other side of the case describes his or her activity as public participation. The challenge is to protect both. As a member of the justice committee, I look forward to examining details of the legislation on Committee Stage, particularly how these safeguards will operate in practice and whether we have achieved the right balance between protecting public participation, people’s good name, and maintaining proper access to justice. On that basis, I am happy to support the Bill proceeding to the next Stage. --- 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/2026-09-29/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:00:59+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-09-29