Ryanair and its chief executive Michael O'Leary appear to be losing their edge as the low fares airlines trips up again on buffoonery. It has paid handsomely over the years in free advertising but in recent months, Ryanair has been accused of telling lies by a High Court judge in Dublin and today, the low fares airline admitted in a London court that it lied about the founder of a rival airline.  

Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, founder of UK low fares airline, easyJet, sued Ryanair because of ads which accused him of stopping publication of weekly reports on easyJet's on-time performance. One ad, which showed Stelios with a long nose, called on him to "stop hiding the truth." However, Stelios was no longer in management at easyJet, but was a non-executive director and major shareholder. He resigned from the airline's board last May.

O'Leary disclosed last February that Ryanair had received a letter from the law firm, Schillings, Sir Stelios' lawyers, accusing the Irish carrier of making "baseless and grossly defamatory" statements about him. A similar letter had been received from easyJet's lawyers Herbert Smith, O'Leary said, complaining about comments made by Ryanair's joint deputy chief executive Michael Cawley.

The letter from Schillings, dated February 5th, noted how the advert "features a photograph of our client which has been doctored to elongate his nose in the style of the children's character Pinnochio, who is known in the public's mind for the trait that his nose grows when he tells a lie.

"The photograph features a speech bubble in which the words 'punctuality is a top priority' are attributed to our client... and bears the caption 'easyJet – Mr Late again".

Schillings demanded an apology and damages, claiming the advert "caused ongoing and escalating damage to our client's reputation."

In his reply to Schillings, O'Leary claimed its letter was "just as full of rubbish as the letter we received from easyJet's lawyers."

In March, a High Court judge in Dublin, called Michael O'Leary a liar over a letter he wrote in February to the Transport Minister in relation to charges at Dublin Airport.

In the letter, O'Leary said Mr Justice Peter Kelly had been critical of the Minister's delays in establishing an appeal panel to review the new charges.

At the Commercial Court, the judge said this statement was a serious misrepresentation and a lie.

Today, Ryanair apologised with reservations: Read the press statement:

Ryanair, Europe’s favourite airline, and Michael O’Leary today apologised unreservedly to Sir Stelios-Haji-Ioannou for including his photograph, and referring to him personally in four adverts which ran in the Daily Telegraph and the Guardian in Jan and Feb 2010. These adverts were published to draw attention to easyJet’s repeated and continuing failure to publish weekly details of their on-time performance.

Both Ryanair and Michael O’Leary now accept that Sir Stelios did not have any input into the decision by easyJet management to stop publishing weekly details of their on-time performance for the past 52 weeks now. Ryanair believes that this non publication arose solely because easyJet wants to hide their poor punctuality and avoid having their flight delays record compared to Ryanair’s superior punctuality. While Ryanair will continue to campaign to encourage easyJet to resume publishing weekly details of their on-time performance statistics, Ryanair and Michael O’Leary accept that Sir Stelios was not responsible for this non publication.

As part of today’s settlement, Ryanair and Michael O’Leary have agreed to pay Stelios damages and his legal costs.

Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary said: “We are happy to apologise to Stelios for including his photograph and referring to him personally in the advert about easyJet’s missing weekly punctuality stats, and since he was not responsible for easyJet’s decision to stop publishing these on-time statistics, I think it is only fair and reasonable that we say “sorry” and pay him damages and his legal costs, rather than waste Court time on this issue.

“Today’s settlement won’t detract from or end Ryanair’s campaign to expose easyJet’s failure to publish its weekly on-time statistics for the last 52 weeks. Ryanair believes they have been hiding these details since May 2009, because they know they can’t compete with Ryanair’s punctuality, just the same way easyJet can’t compete with our pricing either. Perhaps the new management of easyJet will now break with the past and confirm that they will resume publishing weekly details of their on-time stats, so that passengers can compare easyJet’s punctuality with that of Ryanair, and assure themselves that easyJet can’t match Ryanair’s pricing or our punctuality either”.