HOLIDAY and travel comparison website travelsupermarket.com told Dartmouth Business Improvement District’s media relations adviser Philip Cooke that it would need to take legal advice if he didn’t retract an ‘inaccurate’ and ‘unacceptable’ press release.

The threat came after the BID board emailed a newsletter on Thursday night last week, reissuing a press release claiming the Bayard’s Cove Inn had won a travelsupermarket award and taking a swipe at the Chronicle, just hours before last Friday’s paper hit the streets.

Mr Cooke was also told again to get the story removed from another newspaper’s website.

Emma Morris, head of travel PR at travelsupermarket.com, told the Chron­icle that she had strongly advised Mr Cooke last Friday that the situation needed to be resolved as soon as possible.

She added that she felt the story in last Friday’s Chronicle was ‘actually 100 per cent accurate’ and that the ‘content in the press release and now in the newsletter was completely unacceptable’.

The BID emailed an ‘additional statement’ for its subscribers on Sunday. In it, Mr Cooke said: ‘Travel­super­market.com have instructed me to confirm and re-iterate that Bayard’s Cove Inn was not part of an awards programme and was also not voted for. The article on the travelsupermarket.com website featured this B&B in an inspirational round up of great B&Bs up and down the UK only.

‘As the author and distributor of this article, I apologise for any misunderstandings or confusion.’

Ms Morris told the Chron­icle this week: ‘To stress the urgency to Philip, I told him if the issue wasn’t resolved ASAP I would need to speak to our legal team for further advice. Thankfully, it did not get to this point.’

On Tuesday, travelsupermarket also asked for a post on the tourist information centre’s Dartmouth Every Time Facebook page to be removed. In it, Dartmouth Every Time, referring to the false award claims, said: ‘Travelsupermarket have whispered to us that it was their team that decided who to put through rather than putting it to the vote – so they obviously have great taste!!!’

Meanwhile, BID chairman Nigel Way called Chronicle deputy editor Stuart Nuttall to apologise for the slur against the newspaper in the BID’s newsletter, which he said had been ‘rushed out’.