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Newspaper left to pay costs after winning libel challenge over restaurant review

Thursday, 29 January 2009

A Belfast newspaper which successfully challenged a £25,000 libel award for a scathing restaurant review must pick up its own legal bill, judges ruled yesterday.

The Court of Appeal directed there be no order for costs in the case involving the Irish News and Ciarnan Convery, owner of Goodfellas pizzeria.

Its decision means both sides will be left to pay their own expenses for the hearing at which the original damages award was quashed last year.

The case, which centred on a withering appraisal of the restaurant by Irish News food critic Caroline Workman, was the first of its kind to be brought before the courts in Northern Ireland and seen as a potential watershed for press freedom.

Lawyers for the newspaper defended their criticism of Goodfellas on the basis of justification and fair comment.

But according to Mr Convery, who opened the restaurant in 1991, the review was a “hatchet job”. Ms Workman, a former editor of the Bridgestone restaurant guide, gave the eatery a one out of five rating in August 2000.

With the bill for the appeal unresolved, Brian Fee QC for the Irish News argued it was the general rule that the winners should have their costs paid.

But Lord Chief Justice Sir Brian Kerr directed that no order for costs should be made.