Ipso upholds two complaints, but treats each newspaper differently
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Version 0 of 1. The Independent Press Standards Organisation (Ipso) has issued two very different rulings over a similar complaint. In so doing, it has demonstrated that newspapers – even when complaints are upheld, as they were in both these instances – can avoid censure if they make sufficient amends for their errors. On the other hand, Ipso will take a sharper attitude towards papers that fail to react adequately. The complaints were made by Andrew McIntosh, who was upset about articles relating to him that were published in the Dundee Courier and The Herald in Glasgow. They each reported that a dentist, Keith Watson, who had brought a defamation action against McIntosh, had won his case and been awarded £50,000 in damages. In fact, the dentist had dropped his action and been required to pay costs. Their errors were the result of a catastrophic factual error in the news agency copy supplied to the papers by a normally reliable reporter. Both newspapers accepted they had published the erroneous story. However, when McIntosh complained to the editors about the mistake, they reacted differently. According to the Ipso ruling on the Courier’s response, it published a correction in which it explained the correct outcome of the defamation case and pointed out that the dentist had been ordered to pay expenses to McIntosh. It also stated: “We apologise for publishing the incorrect information and for any confusion caused.” The Courier later offered to run a further correction and an apology, and to publish a correct version of the story in the same position as the original article, or to interview McIntosh about the conclusion of the case. But McIntosh did not accept the offers of resolution, and complained to Ipso that the Courier had breached three clauses of the editor’s code of practice– on accuracy, the opportunity to reply and the right to privacy. Meanwhile, the Herald – having also been made aware of the freelance reporter’s error in its original story – amended the article online to make clear what had really happened, and it also published this correction in its print edition: “We reported on Tuesday that dentist Keith Watson had successfully sued a former patient for more than £50,000 in a defamation action. In fact, Mr Watson was granted a Minute of Abandonment and was ordered to pay £10,050 to Andrew McIntosh, the former patient. We took the original information in good faith, based on details supplied by court staff to a court reporter.” McIntosh did not feel that it was adequate. He said the correction had no headline to distinguish it as such, and it did not include an apology. He was also concerned that the correction gave the impression that £10,050 had been paid to him directly, when in fact it had covered his costs. He therefore complained to Ipso about that too, citing the same three clause breaches. Ipso’s complaints committee, in considering the responses of the two newspapers, ruled that both had breached the clause on accuracy and upheld the complaints on that basis (it rejected claims that the papers had not offered an opportunity to reply and had intruded into the complainant’s privacy). But the remedial action it required of the two papers was quite different. In the Courier’s case, it thought it had published an adequate correction and apology. So, in formal terms at the conclusion of its ruling, it said it “was satisfied that these were an appropriate remedy”. In the Herald’s case, it noted that the correction did not include an apology, which the complaints committee believed had been necessary. It required the paper to publish its full adjudication, directing that it should be published on page five or further forward. It also ordered that a link to the adjudication should be published on the home page of the newspaper’s website for at least 48 hours, and then archived. In the print version, the headline to the adjudication should include the words “Ipso complaint upheld” and refer to the subject matter of the original article. So there we are then. A carrot for the Courier but a stick for the Herald. Full Ipso rulings on Courier here and on The Herald here |