From The Globe and Mail:

A Quebec Superior Court judge yesterday ordered Globe and Mail reporter Daniel Leblanc to cease reporting on negotiations between Ottawa and a firm targeted by a massive federal lawsuit in the sponsorship program.

Mr. Justice Jean-François de Grandpré issued the publication ban even though neither side had requested it, Globe and Mail lawyer Mark Bantey said.

"As far as I'm concerned he had no right to do so, with all due respect, and I will appeal it," Mr. Bantey said.

Groupe Polygone is named in a multimillion-dollar federal lawsuit against several firms alleged to have overbilled Ottawa in the sponsorship program.

Judge de Grandpré expressed displeasure during a hearing yesterday over an article last month that reported that Polygone's lawyers had offered about $5-million to settle the firm's portion of the lawsuit and that, although Ottawa had rejected the offer, negotiations were ongoing.

The judge imposed the order during a hearing in which he agreed to delay proceedings involving the firm's request that Mr. Leblanc be required to disclose his confidential sources for stories on the sponsorship scandal.

Earlier in the day, the judge had ordered Mr. Leblanc to appear in a Montreal courtroom to answer questions from the firm's lawyers.

Lawyers for Groupe Polygone obtained court orders last year requiring 22 civil servants and ad-agency employees to disclose to the company's lawyers whether they had ever spoken to Mr. Leblanc about sponsorships.

The 22 recipients were ordered to answer under oath, and were told that they could not disclose to anyone that they had been forced to answer the questions.