The Culture Secretary has launched a formal probe into the proposed £500 million takeover of The Telegraph by the owner of the Daily Mail, a month after Lisa Nandy indicated she was “minded to intervene” on public interest grounds.

On Thursday, she confirmed a public interest intervention into the deal, which would expand one of the UK’s largest media groups.

Ms Nandy expressed “concerns” over the deal’s potential impact on the “plurality of views” in UK news media.

She aims to assess if it will affect newspaper customers by reducing the number of titles owned by different parent groups.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) will now investigate the potential deal and report its findings to the Government.

Ms Nandy added that media regulator Ofcom will also look into the public interest implications for the possible deal.

In November, Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT) agreed to purchase the Telegraph from RedBird IMI after an attempted purchase by the Abu Dhabi-backed investment firm was blocked by the then-Tory government.

A month later DMGT confirmed that it had secured funding to allow it to push forward with the deal.

The purchase would see The Telegraph become part of DMGT’s stable of media organisations, which also includes Metro, The i Paper and New Scientist.

The investigation is the latest twist in a roughly three-year ownership tussle for The Telegraph after it was put up for sale by lenders for previous owners the Barclay brothers.

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An Abu Dhabi-backed consortium had struck a deal to buy the business but saw this blocked by the Government over foreign ownership concerns.

RedBird IMI, which was partly backed by US firm RedBird Capital but majority-owned by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, vice president of the United Arab Emirates, originally agreed to buy the media firm and fellow title The Spectator in 2023.

The Spectator has since been sold to hedge fund tycoon Sir Paul Marshall’s OQS Ventures business for £100 million.

RedBird Capital then agreed a deal without the backing of IMI to buy The Telegraph but saw this collapse late last year before a new deal was struck with DMGT.

Beauty lovers and retail experts have hailed the opening of the first Sephora store on the island of Ireland as “fantastic”.

Shoppers queued around the Victoria Square shopping complex in Belfast on Thursday morning hours ahead of the store’s 1pm opening time.

It is the beauty retailer’s first opening in the UK in 2026, and its 13th UK store to date.

The store is 2,550 sq ft and has been touted as a beauty playground with make-up services on offer as well as products on sale.

It brings a number of internet viral brands which are exclusively available in Sephora to the island of Ireland for the first time.

These include Hailey Bieber’s rhode and Lady Gaga’s Haus Labs, as well as Makeup By Mario, Merit Beauty, INNBeauty Project and Tower 28.

Sephora UK said Belfast is the first of several store openings planned in 2026, with a site Bristol set to open this spring.

Glyn Roberts, chief executive of Retail NI, said it was great news for the city centre, describing a destination retailer that will attract shoppers to travel to the Northern Ireland capital.

“It’s a fantastic investment, not just in Victoria Square and the city centre, but this is the first store on the island and Scotland, so it will quickly become a destination retailer,” he said.

“All the traders in the city centre are going to benefit from the extra football that this store is going to generate, so it is a genuine good news story.

“We’ve had so many bad headlines about stores closing, it’s actually really good to be here this morning at a store opening.

“It shows there is light at the end of the tunnel for the challenges that our high streets face.

“Is there more that we need to do in the city centre, yes there is, but I think today is a big step forward.”

Clare Guinness, chief executive of the Belfast Chamber of Commerce, said it had been a coup to secure the first Sephora on the island over Dublin.

“It’s terrific to have Sephora in Belfast, we’re so delighted to welcome them. It’s a global brand we can normally only visit on holiday, we can now visit in our own city,” she said.

“And what’s exciting is, it obviously appeals to people like me in middle age, but also my 13-year-old daughter is excited too, so you’ve got cross-generational appeal.

“It’s such a coup to get this over Dublin. We are the second city on the island but we’re the first to have Sephora. I think it’s going to fly in Belfast.”

Sarah Boyd, managing director of Sephora UK, said opening the store has been two and a half years in the making.

She also hinted at potential further store openings on the island if the Belfast store is as successful as they expect.

“We’re beyond excited to be here, and we have the most incredible team all hired locally,” she said.

“This is two and a half years in the making, and it is just great to open today.”

Asked what had swayed the decision to open in Belfast, Ms Boyd described looking at cities, and for vibrant beauty communities that are maybe a little under-served.

“Belfast was one of the places that really early in the process came up as somewhere that we had so much response from people saying, ‘please come to Belfast, please come to Northern Ireland and please come to Ireland’ generally,” she said.

“We knew there was that community here already, and as soon as I visited a couple of years ago, I knew that it was going to be a great home for us here.

“At the moment all of the other stores opening this year are all either in England or Scotland, but if the response here is overwhelming, then of course we’ll be looking at more locations.”