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Press Ombudsman and Press Council uphold Sean Quinn's complaints against the Sunday Tribune
Headoffice, Derrylin, Co. Fermanagh
"I welcome the recent decisions (Decision 1, Decision 2) of both the Press Council and the Press Ombudsman who found that the Sunday Tribune's recent coverage of me and of my businesses has been both inaccurate and unfair. In addition to the two decisions published the Press Ombudsman also requested that I be given a right of reply to be published in the Tribune (Decision 3)."
"Unfortunately despite the decision of the Ombudsman, the Tribune have confirmed that they will not comply with that decision. Therefore I have decided to publish the right of reply here. I feel that the Tribune's decision not to publish unfortunately shows how little respect they have for the office of the Press Ombudsman and how little interest they have in proper press regulation."Sean Quinn
Sean Quinn – A Right of Reply
On 27th March, 2009, after the publication by the Sunday Tribune of a number of articles about me and our Group which I considered to be biased and unfair, I complained to the Press Ombudsman regarding four of these articles. Both the Ombudsman and the Press Council (on appeal by the Tribune) found against the Sunday Tribune regarding two of these complaints. The Ombudsman directed that a right of reply offered by the Sunday Tribune regarding the third complaint was an adequate response to the third complaint. It is this right of reply that I am now exercising. The Ombudsman did not feel I had grounds for the remaining complaint.
On 12th February this year the Sunday Tribune published an article naming me, amongst others, as being responsible for causing the recession. I have been blamed for many things but starting the recession is one of the most ridiculous accusations ever leveled against me. Most intelligent people know that the origins of the recession are in the US where an explosion of credit fuelled the sub-prime crisis and, when the extent of the problem became apparent, created an international funding crisis.
As a small, open economy, Ireland was hit harder than most as we had effectively been living beyond our means for the past number of years and had built up a high cost base in both the public and private sector. The gravy train created by the property bubble has now stopped and Ireland is having difficulty making ends meet with its current cost structure.
Whilst very few predicted the severity of this downturn, the Quinn Group has always focused on ensuring that we can outperform our peers by benchmarking our operational costs against the best international operators. We achieve this through investing in the best technology and having the support of a very dedicated and high quality workforce.
Despite the fact that the majority of our business is now done outside of Ireland, 5,500 of our 8,000 staff are based in Ireland; the majority from the local region of Fermanagh, Cavan and Leitrim. All of my family live, work, and pay their taxes in Ireland and I am committed to continuing to develop our business here.
Whilst in recent times we have incurred heavy losses in the stock-market and I have been fined by the Financial Regulator, we have never cost the Irish tax-payer a penny. Our Group has contributed more than €1 billion to the Irish Exchequer over the past decade. With our increasing level of exports, and as we continue to innovate and develop new products, this contribution will increase significantly in the coming decade. I would expect that the Sunday Tribune journalists are reasonably intelligent and therefore it is difficult to see how they could conclude that I caused the recession. So why did they make that assertion?
I have no doubt the reason dates back to 1 April 2007 when the Sunday Tribune published a forged memo claiming that Quinn direct was involved in illegal and unethical practices. On 5 April 2007, after the Tribune declined to admit that the document was a forgery, we began a libel case against the Sunday Tribune regarding their publication of this forged memo. Notwithstanding a subsequent Garda investigation in August 2007 reported by two national papers as concluding that the document was a forgery, the Tribune has refused to acknowledge its mistake.
Since then the Sunday Tribune has published negative and unbalanced articles about me and the Quinn Group. The Press Ombudsman’s decision, as upheld on appeal by the Press Council, has now confirmed that the Sunday Tribune’s coverage of me and the Group was both ‘inaccurate’ and ‘unfair’. I can only come to the disturbing conclusion that rather than admit to its error in publishing a forged memo, the Tribune has instead deliberately attempted to tarnish our reputation and damage our business further while we are pursuing a legitimate libel case against them.
More than ever, our country needs Irish businesses to put the shoulder to the wheel and turn our economy around. I think management at the Sunday Tribune should reflect on their position. I again call on them to do the right and honorable thing, admit their error and move on.
Sean Quinn
26 Jun 2009
