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County View The question still remains as to how the cost of a libel case could have reached €3 million.
The exorbitant cost of court
County View John Healy WHEN the Liveline outrage over Beverley Flynn’s settlement with RTÉ dies down, and when the Dublin media finally decide that the hounding of the Mayo TD is over, the question still remains as to how the cost of a libel case could have reached the figure of €3 million. Gerard Colleran, the straight-talking editor of the Irish Daily Star, and panellist on Questions and Answers, had little doubt but that it was down to the obscene fees charged by the barristers at the Four Courts which accounted for most of the demand. And if libel trials in general are seen as a bonanza by the legal profession, then the Flynn case must have been a Klondike for the wigged wonders of the law library. What might have been overlooked in the controversy over whether RTÉ caved in or not in the end was the fact that the national broadcaster had seen fit to underwrite not one, not two, but three separate legal teams to defend the case in the courts. James Howard had one set of counsel; Charlie Bird had another, and RTÉ itself a third and separate legal team, with RTÉ picking up the tab for the whole show. Tot up what ten barristers for 20 days at €10,000 a shot is going to cost, and all of a sudden a figure of €2 million popping up on a cash register is no great shock. In what was an impressive piece of radio interviewing, RTÉ Radio’s Sean O’Rourke pulled no punches in putting his boss, the Director General Cathal Goan, through some tough hoops in explaining the Beverley settlement. Harried by O’Rourke as to whether RTÉ had been leaned on politically to settle with Flynn, the DG gave the impression of a man none too comfortable with the denials. For the average listener, the only conclusion was that the Taoiseach’s public endorsement of Beverley Flynn’s future political career must have had an arresting affect on how RTÉ chose to pursue the case. Interesting too that while Cathal Goan insisted that the television licence holder would not be at a loss as a result of the negotiated settlement, he was not challenged to explain how this happy outcome was to be realised. It took the Sunday papers to uncover that RTÉ’s insurers would be stumping up the €1 million plus shortfall on Beverley’s payment – enough to keep the hired legal experts fully compensated for their endeavours. In the event, RTÉ’s claim that it secured the best deal possible seems near enough to the mark. It might have let Beverley Flynn away with much less, knowing that its insurance cover would take care of the balance; but this would mean a much higher insurance premium the next time round. It could equally, as the Dublin media seemed to demand, try to force Beverley Flynn out of public life altogether, laying down a salutary marker to anyone who might in future have the temerity to take on the national broadcaster. Columnist John Waters has quite rightly seized on the Flynn libel action to question why it should cost so much for someone to try to vindicate their name. The protection of an individual’s reputation is a fundamental right of citizenship, he maintains; but that right is meaningless for most citizens if it means risking all they own, and will own into the future, to establish that right. It may well be, says Waters, that Flynn’s legal action was ill-advised and foolhardy. But, he goes on, that is not the point. Every defamation action must have a winner and a loser. “To suggest, therefore, that by virtue of suing and losing, Flynn has placed herself beyond public sympathy, is to say that the interests of the media are the highest morality of all,” concludes Waters, in an analysis which will surely raise new questions even as the Flynn case is filed away for history.
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