Neil Morrissey accepts Daily Mail 'bar ban' article payout

Neil Morrissey has been awarded "substantial" damages by the Daily Mail over an article that wrongly claimed he was banned from a bar in France for drunken behaviour.

The Men Behaving Badly actor sued the paper's publisher Associated Newspapers for libel over a March 2011 article, entitled, "Homme behaving badly: TV star banned from bar near his idyllic French retreat after locals object to 'le binge drinking'".

Last October, The Daily Mail ran an apology for the article in its new corrections and clarifications column, but Morrissey opted to pursue legal options after being dissatisfied with the action.

His solicitor, Peter Crawford, told Judge Richard Parkes QC that the article in the Daily Mail alleged that the actor was banned from the bar near his French home because of his drunken and rowdy behaviour.

A similar article appeared on the paper's website, accompanied by a photograph of what was claimed to be a poster at the bar showing Morrissey with the warning: "Do not serve this man."

"The Mail alleged...Mr Morrissey had been banned because his behaviour had made him unwelcome to the proprietors and staff as a bad influence who encouraged the antisocial and offensive binge drinking for which English settlers had become notorious and were resented by local French people," said Crawford.

"Those assertions were not true. Most significantly, Mr Morrissey had not been banned from the bar. Nor had he been drunken or rowdy in the bar."

Crawford did not disclose the exact amount of damages paid to Morrissey, but did reveal that it was a five-figure sum.

The actor, who is currently appearing in Oliver at Cardiff, was not in court for the verdict, but said in a statement read to the court that he now felt "fully vindicated" over the claims.

"It proved impossible to agree the wording of a suitable retraction and apology but the Mail published its own tiny version of an apology which bore no relation at all to the eye-catching space given to the original article," he said.

"My solicitor read a statement in court today in the hope that the Mail's apology would reach more of its readers."

The Daily Mail had acknowledged that the story was false and defamatory in August last year, and agreed to pay Morrissey damages in November.

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