News

Daraine Luton, Senior Staff Reporter

PARLIAMENT HAS expressed unease about a proposal by Prime Minister Bruce Golding to remove the threat of a prison sentence from journalists who publish credit bureau information in contravention of a confidentiality clause.

The House of Representatives had previously signed off on the credit-reporting bill and sent it to the Senate for its approval.

However, the bill was sent back for amendments, and when the House of Representatives met on Tuesday to reconsider the proposals, Golding told the House that the Media Association of Jamaica was unhappy with a clause that could land journalists in jail.

"The media association has raised with us that a journalist or a publisher could be imprisoned for publishing information which they came into possession of," Golding said.

The prime minister noted that media practitioners view the punishment as an encroachment on freedom of expression and freedom of the press.

"I have pointed out that we had to retain a restriction, otherwise we would have jeopardised an essential element of the whole credit-reporting system", said Golding referring to the need for confidentiality.

The amendment

He proposed that the section of the bill, which proposes that a person who knowingly receives, uses or discloses credit information obtained by any person in contravention of the act be retained as an offence.

A fair compromise, Golding suggested, was to remove the two-year prison term and keep the penalty at $2 million.

Central Kingston MP Ronald Thwaites, however, said that those who would wish a mitigation of the penalty were forgetting that journalists do not often disclose their sources and that the revelation of confidential information could have devastating consequences for persons' reputations.

Similarly, Robert Pickersgill, MP for North West St Catherine, questioned what legal recourse would be available if journalists refuse to pay fines.

Dr Omar Davies, MP for South St Andrew, also disagreed with the prime minister's proposed change.

"You would have an offence which would have two different penalties. An officer who has access to information who would receive a separate penalty from the journalist. You would not have the possibility of this offence being committed through collusion between an officer who has access and a journalist who would be published," Davies said.

But Golding countered that there needed to be a greater burden of responsibility on the persons legally authorised to deal with credit-reporting information.

Meanwhile, a new subsection in the bill sent back by the Senate proposes that the minister makes his determination on a licence application within 120 days once all information has been submitted, in order to allow the applicant to know of the outcome.

The Senate has proposed new subsections which would indemnify the credit bureau against criminal or civil proceedings if it unwittingly discloses inaccurate information.

The Upper House has also proposed to remove the threat of sanctions from the credit bureau if it, after having reasonable cause to suspect the inaccuracy of information, gives immediate notice of the inaccuracy to the customer concerned and to each person to whom it disclosed the information and take steps to correct the information within its files.

daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com