Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation Bill 2026: Second Stage
Dail Éireann — 2026-09-29
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Richard O'Donoghue (II), Limerick County

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Bill. To simplify it for people, an investigative journalist should be protected. From an investigative point of view, a person may be in a Department, in government or in Revenue. I have two cases before Revenue. They are not for me but for my constituents. To tell the truth, from the couple of cases I have in different parts of Revenue, things are sitting on desks for 12 months and are not being looked at. The knock-on effect of this is the legal bills involved. If somebody is whistleblowing, they are up against the management in these places. People in that position are afraid to do anything because it might affect their jobs. People are actually shoved out in the cold. We can see what happened with the whistleblowers in An Garda Síochána and the Prison Service. They were cast out. Why were there no protections there?
It is the same thing when we talk about journalism. If a journalist is investigating something that is wrong and pressure comes on him or her from a legal perspective, he or she should 100% be protected.
It is the same thing for a sitting TD, Senator or councillor. If they see something wrong and highlight it, they should be protected.
We have seen how many years it took when we had people under investigation in the Garda. All those gardaí were acquitted of any wrongdoing. What stood in the way of that happening? How many years? How many people did not get to where they needed to get in their careers? It not only affected them but their families and extended families. The gardaí are our protectors. I have the utmost respect for the gardaí and I encourage people to join the Garda service. If you are in the Garda protecting people in your area, there should be the same protections for you if there is an internal matter in the service. In any walk of life, no matter where you work or what you work at, there is always a minority of people that do things for the wrong reasons, but the majority are there for the right reasons. We need to make sure the majority of people, those who are there for the right reasons and who want to make things better, are protected, while the ones there for the wrong reasons, even those in positions of power, are held accountable. That is what we need to do and what I would like to see happening.
Looking at criminals and reoffenders, some people are getting free legal aid who have been 25 or 30 times in front of the courts. It is fine if you have done something once or twice, something goes wrong and you get free legal aid, but when you are doing something 30 times, does it not show we have a problem? We are giving them free legal aid. It was brought up in our local authority in Limerick by Councillor John O'Donoghue that there should be a cap put on somebody who reoffends repeatedly. How are you going to learn from anything if you keep getting free legal aid? That is also an issue that needs to be discussed.
From the Garda Commissioner down, everyone should be treated as an equal, regardless of their position, when it comes to accountability. I hope this Bill, when it goes through, reflects that. The same goes for Departments. If our Departments, or certain parts of them, are not doing right, they should be held accountable. Everyone is entitled to legal aid, but I have an issue with it when people reoffend and need to be accountable.

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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