A daily newspaper has vowed to stick to its guns after being ordered to pay out £25,000 damages to a restaurant over a food critic’s review.

In a verdict likely to give restaurant critics indigestion, a jury took just 90 minutes to conclude that a review in the Belfast-based Irish News contained defamatory comments.

The Irish News has instructed its lawyers to lodge an appeal against the decision. Caroline Workman, the newspaper’s restaurant critic, in 2000 described Goodfellas, a West Belfast pizzeria, as having unhelpful staff, flat cola and chicken marsala “so sweet as to be inedible”.

A spokesman for The Irish News said: “The outcome of this case raises profound questions involving the freedom of the press. We believe that newspapers must have the right to publish fair and honestly written reviews, contributed by experts in their particular field and engaging in either praise or criticism when it is justified.”

The restaurant’s owner, Ciaran Convery, claimed the article was a hatchet job and sued.

A jury at Belfast High Court agreed, after his lawyers claimed that the review was damaging and hurtful and said the newspaper had failed to retract or apologise.

Mr Convery, who was also awarded costs, was jubilant after his win. “I think justice has been done. Goodfellas is a successful business and today’s verdict has proved to me, my staff and my customers that we did the right thing by launching the libel action.”

The Irish News spokesman said: “We are convinced that a public interest issue of the utmost importance is at stake here, and we have therefore instructed our lawyers to enter an immediate appeal.”

The National Union of Journalists is backing the appeal, arguing that the verdict poses a disturbing precedent for freedom of speech.

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