New protections for businesses against defamation claims aren’t good enough, according to business owners.

The Defamation Bill 2024, which is due before the Seanad today, does not go far enough to protect businesses, they claim, and they have called for certain amendments.

Shane Gleeson, who runs five Spar shops across Limerick, said businesses have been suffering from “dodgy claims” for the past while now.

 “We’ve had a load now in the last six months of people pretending to steal,” he told Lunchtime Live.

“They’ll put something in their pocket, they’ll walk around the shop, they’ll shove it back on a corner as they go around the corner, and they’re hoping that the staff will ask them, ‘Is there something else to pay for?’

“Then they usually start shouting at you, saying, ‘You accused me of stealing!’

“Normally they have a few people waiting to hear them, and they’ve been nicely set up for a defamation claim.”

Mr Gleeson said it is incredibly frustrating, as he is losing “50-odd thousand per shop” on shoplifting every year, yet staff are unable to question those they suspect of theft.

Hands with 100 Euro banknotes, which are counted and put on a table. Image: Klaus Ohlenschlaeger / Alamy. 5 January 2018

Owner of Clarke’s XL shop and petrol station in County Mayo Sheila Clarke said she has been “nearly reduced to tears” when dealing with a customer in a similar situation.

“In one instance, I asked the lady if she’d gotten fuel, because we’re a filling station, so we have fuel to account for as well,” she said.

“She lost the plot with me, this individual.

“Now, she just personally took exception to my asking her, it’s not one of those instances where we were looking to make a claim.

“She threatened that she was going to take it further, but it was a bit of an empty threat, as it turned out.”

Ms Clarke said “retailers are just left hung out to dry at every turn”.

'A little bit weak'

Senior Counsel and specialist in media law Ronan Lupton said that while businesses are legally afforded the right to inquire into suspected instances of theft, the real issue is that “individuals know that they can rattle the cage”.

“The value of a case is probably only worth between five and seven thousand, in the lower end of the brackets, of awards and damages,” he said.

“But the costs of trying to defend that for the retailer could run into 20, 30, 40,000 euro.”

As a result, insurers will aim to settle cases out of court to keep the costs low.

According to Mr Gleeson, the current Defamation Bill is “a little bit weak as it stands”.

There have been calls made for the bill to include a ‘harms test’, whereby a case cannot be brought forward if no serious harm was caused.

Main image: Disagreement between a waiter and a customer. Image: Wavebreak Media ltd. 10 April 2015