Irish Mail on Sunday denies deceiving Tribune readership

THE Irish Mail on Sunday has denied claims it tried to deceive readers into buying the paper by publishing a special edition with a fake Sunday Tribune masthead.

Associated Newspapers Ireland, owners of the Irish Mail on Sunday, is being prosecuted at the Dublin District Civil Court for breaching the Consumer Protection Act.

The National Consumer Agency (NCA) brought the case after complaints by readers who bought the edition on February 6 thinking they had bought the Sunday Tribune, days after it went into receivership.

A receiver was appointed to the loss-making Tribune on February 1, and the decision was made two days later not to bring out a final edition on February 6.

The Irish Mail on Sunday distributed about 26,000 editions on the east coast featuring a wraparound cover with a heading saying “a special edition designed for readers of the Sunday Tribune”.

Noirin Hegarty, the Tribune’s editor for six years prior to its closure, said that on February 6, she learned there was a paper purporting to be the Sunday Tribune.

She told Jonathan Kilfeather SC, for the NCA, that the masthead and colours were the same as the Tribune’s, and similar fonts were used.

Witness Pierce Farrell told the court he felt “duped” when he bought one and later discovered it was the Irish Mail on Sunday.

Paul Henderson, managing director of Associated Newspapers Ireland, said the wraparound was a “marketing stunt” to attract Tribune readers and denied that there was any intention to deceive.

Sebastian Hamilton, editor of the Irish Mail on Sunday, said that when a newspaper closes, its readers can be lost to the market immediately unless they have been attracted to an alternative title.