The recent decision of management at the Irish Independent to withdraw an article on the Dunne retailing family from its editions has been condemned in strong terms by the National Union of Journalists (NUJ).
The union said the decision to remove the article, about the succession stakes at the head of the Dunnes operation, represented "interference in the editorial independence of the newspaper".
A statement issued by the union and the branch officers at the newspaper said the decision was not taken on journalistic grounds.
The Irish secretary of the NUJ, Mr Seamus Dooley, said: "The NUJ has always resisted interference in editorial independence and I was disturbed to learn of the behaviour of senior personnel within the company last weekend."
The NUJ has asked for a meeting of the management-editorial committee, as provided for in the house agreement. The meeting would discuss the reasons why the article was withdrawn and what can be done to prevent such things happening again.
The committee should also be asked to consider a protocol for dealing with the presentation of commercial features on the news pages, according to the NUJ.
The local chapel - branch - of the union passed a motion yesterday supporting any colleague who resisted pressure from outside commercial interests to withhold material. They said it would support any colleagues who were victimised for resisting such pressure.
Mr Dooley said there was an onus on reporters to ignore all but journalistic considerations when writing stories. "Business journalists must be assured that when they write sensitive stories they will not be subject to outside pressure. When pressure is applied, journalists must be sure that editorial management will give the appropriate response," he said.
Management at the newspaper declined to comment on the matter last night.