The Irvings and the courts
Deb Jones tracks the story of a New Brunswick newspaper family’s legal struggle against an ex-employee who allegedly stole their publishing secrets and now wants to start a competing newspaper.
Declaring that an Irving-owned newspaper “cannot claim a monopoly over advertisers or its customers,” a New Brunswick judge has cleared the way for a publisher to compete against the Irving family in the province’s weekly newspaper market, reported Canadian Press.
Justice Peter Glennie of the New Brunswick Court of Queen’s Bench denied the portion of an injunction reques from Irving-owned Brunswick News Inc. that would have prevented a former Irving employee from soliciting key advertisers for his new weekly. Glennie said that the marketplace should be free to decide the fate of competing newspapers. (In New Brunswick, where the Irvings have a monopoly on print media and a virtual lock on the economy, Glennie sounds utterly radical.)
New Brunswick news accuses Ken Langdon Friday, former publisher of the Irving-owned Woodstock Bugle-Observer, of stealing corporate secrets from the Irvings. On the flip side, Langdon accuses a Brunswick News vice-president of being prepared to establish a $1-million fund to drive another local competitor out of business.
View all Irving stories.
Here is the Nov. 2 Canadian Press story by Chris Morris. CBC Radio also reported on the Glennie decision.
A New York Times story Oct. 28 shows how New Brunswick’s media monopoly is seen elsewhere.
See also: Media Concentration in Atlantic Canada: Media by Monopoly
