Mr Albert Reynolds was one of the chief architects of the peace process and, given that fact, it had been in the British public interest that an article was published by the Sunday Times, the Court of Appeal in London was told yesterday.
Lord Lester QC was appealing a ruling of the Royal Courts of Justice on the issue of qualified privilege which arose out of Mr Reynolds's libel case against the newspaper.
He said that the question raised was whether common law qualified privilege applied to the publication to the public at large of defamatory words arising out of the discussion of political matters.
The judge at the trial of the libel action ruled that no such privilege attached to the words complained of in the article in the Sunday Times in November 1994.
Lord Lester, on the opening day of the Sunday Times appeal, said that the question for the court to determine was whether the defence of qualified privilege applied in the circumstances of this case to the publication in good faith by the Sunday Times, its editor and journalist, to their readers of defamatory words reflecting upon the reputation of Mr Albert Reynolds TD, as Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland, as leader of the Fianna Fail party and as an elected member of the Dail, in the discharge of his public functions.
The jury in the libel action decided that the words were defamatory, but awarded zero damages. However, an award of one penny was subsequently substituted by the judge. The jury also decided that the Sunday Times had not acted maliciously in publishing the words.
"Qualified privilege was there to enable newspapers and others to report on politicians, even when they get it wrong, providing there is no malice", Lord Lester said.
Qualified privilege arose, in particular, where a person was an elected politician and where the defamatory words complained of related to his conduct in his public role and not to his private life or to anything he had said or done in a purely personal capacity.
"The reasons for extending qualified privilege are still more compelling where the plaintiff enjoys immunity from suit for defamation in relation to what he says in the legislature", he said.
"The public interest in free and fearless political debate underlies both that constitutional immunity and the extension of qualified privilege to publications defamatory of elected politicians."
The words had been published in the course of public discussion and political debate about, in particular, the circumstances in which the Labour Party had withdrawn its support from the coalition with Fianna Fail, leading to the collapse of the government and Mr Reynolds's resignation as Taoiseach.
"Those circumstances were of very considerable significance and interest in the United Kingdom because of the critical stage of the Northern Ireland peace process and ceasefires and the personal identification with that process of the plaintiff (Mr Reynolds) and Mr Dick Spring, the Labour leader", Lord Lester stated.
He said that Mr Reynolds was one of the chief architects of the peace process, being joint author with Mr John Major of the Downing Street Declaration. Mr Spring was the responsible departmental minister and had made a significant contribution to the peace process.