Ryanair ordered to pay €60,000 to newlyweds

A FRENCH judge ruled that Ryanair improperly used a picture of French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his new wife, ex-supermodel Carla Bruni, in an advertisement, and ordered the carrier to pay the newlyweds €60,000 in damages.

Ryanair said it accepted the court’s decision and offered to make an additional €60,000 donation to a charity of Mr Sarkozy’s choice.

The case was aired in the French court last week when Mr Sarkozy and Ms Bruni, then unmarried, sued the airline for placing an advertisement in a French newspaper featuring their picture with a thought bubble above Ms Bruni’s head stating: “With Ryanair, all my family can come to my wedding.”

The pair, who married on Saturday in a low-key ceremony at the presidential palace in Paris, said commercial use of the photograph was unauthorised and inappropriate.

Mr Sarkozy, 53, sought and received a symbolic one euro in damages. Ms Bruni, 40, had asked for €500,000, the amount she claimed to receive for appearing in advertisements.

Yesterday, the French court ordered Ryanair to pay Mr Sarkozy the symbolic sum of one euro, while Ms Bruni is to receive €60,000.

Ryanair issued a statement last week apologising for offence caused and promising not to run the ad again.

A Ryanair spokesman said yesterday: “In the light of the extraordinary worldwide publicity generated by this single advert, we have instructed our lawyers to write to President Sarkozy’s office, offering to make a similar €60,000 payment to any French charity of President Sarkozy’s choice.”

This is not the first time the carrier grabbed headlines for self promotion.

Last week, a controversial ad, featuring a scantily-clad Britney Spears clone, was banned by the advertising standards authority on the grounds it “appeared to link teenage girls with sexually provocative behaviour, and was irresponsible and likely to cause serious or widespread offence”.

This month, the British consumer watchdog hit out at Ryanair for failing to change its website to include all fixed, non-optional costs in prices.

The office of fair trading said it was disappointed the airline had not met an agreed date of January 31 for changing its website. They extended the time period given to Ryanair to include taxes and charges in ticket prices in all parts of its website.

Last July, the British advertising authority upheld complaints against two of four Ryanair advertisements which criticised British PM Gordon Brown over air passenger duty.

The airline used pictures of the then Chancellor in adverts which complained about the increased tax rate.

One advert said Mr Brown had “fleeced” holiday makers in an air passenger tax “deception”, adding: “£1 billion just disappears into greedy Gordon’s pockets”.

“Not a penny spent on the environment, aviation accounts for just 2% of CO2 emissions and yet he pulled it off — unbelievable.”

Treasury figures for emissions from domestic British flights and international flights from Britain put CO2 emissions at 5.5% of Britain’s total CO2 output.