Coffey defamation action: TD who sent press release says locals were 'up in arms' about Waterford/Kilkenny boundary review

A TD who issued a press release at the centre of the Senator Paudie Coffey defamation action told the High Court he did not think the newspaper's coverage of the change of boundary issue in Waterford/Kilkenny was balanced.

Carlow-Kilkenny Deputy John Paul Phelan, who is a junior environment minister, also denied he felt betrayed by Mr Coffey's announcement that there was to be a boundary commission review to look at moving part of Kilkenny into the Waterford administrative area.

He was giving evidence on the eighth day of Mr Coffey's action against Iconic Newspaper, publishers of the Kilkenny People over the January 2016 article.

Headlined "Coffey the Robber", it carried quotes from a press release issued by Mr Phelan, who is Mr Coffey's Fine Gael colleague, saying then junior minister Coffey was "banding together" with then environment minister Alan Kelly to commit "daylight robbery".

He then went on to say there was an 18th-century highwayman in Waterford called "Crotty the Robber" and now "Coffey the Robber was trying to do the very same".

Mr Coffey says it meant he was guilty of misuse of public office and a thief of severe ill repute. The defendant denies the claims.

Senator Paudie Coffey

Mr Phelan told Rossa Fanning SC, Iconic, he was shocked when he learned from a tweet that Mr Coffey, in 2015, announced there was to be a boundary review.

People in Kilkenny were "up in arms" about it as they had been in a previous proposal in 2005 to move part of Kilkenny into Waterford and it was very much associated with identity, he said.

Cross-examined by Barney Quirke SC, for Mr Coffey, he agreed he was angry over the boundary review move. He disagreed he was hurt and angry that he had not been told about it beforehand by his colleague but was surprised it had not been discussed politically before the announcement.

He disagreed with counsel's suggestion he felt "betrayed and bitter" by the move on the boundary review.

'Hands off Kilkenny'

He described as "outrageous" a suggestion by counsel that if it was him and not a Kilkenny People journalist who wrote the article. "What you are saying is patently false", he said. He sent press releases to the paper, but he had never written an article in his life.

He was surprised by the "Coffey the Robber" headline as the heading on his release was "hands off Kilkenny".

Asked did he think the Kilkenny People's general coverage of the boundary issue was balanced, he said he did not think so.

Asked was it fair, he said that if you were a ratepayer in Kilkenny and €110m of your budget was to be removed by a boundary change, that would mean an increase in rates for those people and that got them agitated along with the identity issue.

Pressed by counsel about the need to provide fairness and balance, he repeated he did not think it was balanced because it was all from the Kilkenny side of the argument but that was from a paper which circulates mainly to Kilkenny people.

When counsel said the "robber" story was a "shocking article to publish", he said he was surprised about it.

If it happened to him, he would be "up in arms", counsel said. "I wouldn't be happy", he said.

He also disagreed he had an unusual relationship with the Kilkenny People which, counsel said, never criticised him.

Mr Phelan said his relationship was normally just issuing press releases but while he would expect criticism, he would never expect a local newspaper to very badly criticise the local TD.

The case resumes on Tuesday.