Monday 8 August 2011

Mail clarifies a 'suggestion'

On 9 April, the Mail reported:


Journalist Ryan Kisiel said:

councillors are spending thousands of pounds remembering tomorrow’s 30th anniversary

and:

The Labour-run authority is funding the event despite constant complaints by its leader, Steve Reed, that government-imposed cash cuts would lead to a rise in crime and another ‘Baby P tragedy’.

Two days later, Lambeth Council issued a statement that said:

Contrary to media reports, this was not a council organised event but meeting of community groups and activist, who wanted to remember and reflect. The event was not funded by the public purse.

And last week, nearly four months later, the Mail published a clarification:

An article on April 9 suggested that Lambeth Council had spent thousands of pounds on an event to mark the 30th anniversary of the Brixton riots. In fact, the council did not directly fund this event. We are happy to set the record straight.

Notice how the clarification - which isn't an apology - only says that they 'suggested' the Council was funding the event. Suggested? Surely stated it, very clearly, three times, would be more accurate?

3 comments:

  1. And by suggesting the council didn't 'directly' fund the event (and event itself seems an odd choice) the implicit implication is that the council did do a lot to help fund it even it it didn't write the check itself.

    ReplyDelete
  2. While we're at it:

    The event was not funded by the public purse.

    does not seem to me to mean the same things as:

    The council did not directly fund this event

    ReplyDelete
  3. Check out this from Max Hastings... absolutely no reference in the article!

    Do rioters, pictured looting a shop in Hackney, have lower levels of a brain chemical that helps keep behaviour under control? Scientists think so

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2024284/UK-riots-2011-Liberal-dogma-spawned-generation-brutalised-youths.html#ixzz1UeeN833y

    ReplyDelete

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