BC and AD not 'jettisoned' by BBC

Last Sunday, Mail on Sunday columnist Peter Hitchens wrote:

The BBC’s Chief Commissar for Political Correctness (whom I imagine as a tall, stern young woman in cruel glasses issuing edicts from an austere office) was hard at work again last week.

On University Challenge, Jeremy Paxman referred to a date as being Common Era, rather than AD. This nasty formulation is designed to write Christianity out of our culture.

One week on, and his paper has decided this observation is worthy of the front page lead:

The article by Chris Hastings begins:

The BBC has been accused of 'absurd political correctness' after dropping the terms BC and AD in case they offend non-Christians.

The Corporation has replaced the familiar Anno Domini (the year of Our Lord) and Before Christ with the obscure terms Common Era and Before Common Era.

'Jettisoned'. 'Dropped'. 'Replaced'.

But skip to the statement from the BBC - inevitably relegated to the very last paragraph of the story - and we're told:

The BBC said last night: 'The BBC has not issued editorial guidance on the date systems. Both AD and BC, and CE and BCE are widely accepted date systems and the decision on which term to use lies with individual production and editorial teams.'

So the BBC uses both. Indeed, Hastings' article proves BC and AD haven't been 'jettisoned' when he points out:

The terms are not confined to religious output and have also been used in news bulletins. Some reports add to the confusion by switching between both terms in the same item.

He goes on to quote several people unhappy with the BBC, who seem to believe BC and AD have, indeed, been 'dropped' (probably because that's what Hastings told them when he asked for their reaction). But he also gets a quote from Today and Mastemind presenter John Humphrys who says:

"I will continue to use AD and BC because I don't see a problem."

Despite this Hastings believes his story is true and he knows what's behind it:

This is not the first time the BBC has caused controversy over its use of alien language to promote a politically correct, Europhile agenda.

It's not clear why CE and BCE are deemed 'alien' or 'Europhile'. It's not as if the terms are new - the Mail on Sunday includes a box which dates them back to the mid-nineteenth century. It also says they are becoming 'particularly common in the United States'.

In the article, Simon Schama says he's been 'familar' with BC and BCE 'since the Fifties'. And, as Hastings points out, it's not even as if the BBC has only just started using the terms - one example he highlights dates from March 2010:

Last year, Northern Ireland correspondent William Crawley referred to the construction of the Temple of Solomon in about 950 BCE.

So Hastings has the BBC quote denying the terms have been dropped. He has a prominent BBC presenter saying he's going to keep using the BC and AD. And he has his own evidence saying BBC journalists are 'switching between both terms'.

Yet Hastings still writes the article in this way, and the Mail on Sunday still splashes it all over the front page.

UPDATE: James Delingpole has a comment piece on this in the Mail's RightMinds section. He apparently sees this 'news' as evidence of a:

Marxist plot to destroy civilisation from within

He says:

No longer will its website refer to those bigoted, Christian-centric concepts AD (as in Anno Domini – the Year of Our Lord) and BC (Before Christ)...All reference to Christ has been expunged

If only the BBC website didn't prove him wrong.

Too much and not enough

Following the death of two horses during this year's Grand National, the Mail's website and the Mail on Sunday picked up on some critical viewer comments that claimed the BBC had glossed over the equine fatalities. The Mail accused the BBC of a 'cover-up' and reported:

One viewer wrote on the corporation’s own website: ‘I’m amazed that the BBC coverage pans over the tarpaulins on the re-run and the commentators just talk about “obstacles”.’

Another said: ‘And the BBC – shame on you. No mention of what’s happened, even when there’s 2 dead covered horses on screen.’

But yesterday, Mail diarist Richard Kay was all-too pleased to repeat comments made to him by former BBC racing commentator Peter O'Sullevan, who attacked the BBC for a rather different reason:

‘Someone at the BBC obviously wanted to make a name for himself,’ he tells me. ‘They want to make it more sensational, with shots of dead horses and focusing on the tragic and unexpected deaths that occurred this year. It really is unacceptable.’

So the Mail newspapers happily repeat claims the BBC didn't cover the deaths enough and claims the BBC covered them too much.

Damned if they do and damned if they don't.

Mail on Sunday apologises for claiming French bank was on 'brink of disaster'

On 9 August, this apology to Société Générale was published on the Mail's website:

In an article that appeared in the print edition and online version of the Mail on Sunday on 7 August 2011, it was suggested that according to Mail on Sunday sources Société Générale, one of Europe's largest banks, was in a 'perilous' state and possibly on the 'brink of disaster'.

We now accept that this was not true and we unreservedly apologise to Société Générale for any embarrassment caused.

So the Mail on Sunday claimed a major bank was on the 'brink of disaster' - based on an anonymous source - and two days later accepted that 'was not true'.

The next day, as its share price began to fall, Société Générale issued a statement 'categorically and vigorously' denying all 'unfounded rumours' about its position.

The New York Times has suggested that the Mail on Sunday had picked up on a fictional 12-part series run by Le Monde:

The series, “End of the Line for the Euro,” looked at how a collapse of the single currency might play out, against the backdrop of French presidential elections next year. While the 12-part story was clearly labeled as fiction, it named real banks, like Société Générale, whose shares plunged 15 percent last Wednesday, prompting the bank to deny speculation that it was in financial trouble.

However, Le Monde denied there was any link between those articles and the stock drop. Erik Izraelewicz, the paper's top editorial executive, wrote:

“The reality is that our fiction had nothing to do with this crazy rumor...The paradox is that this case has come to illustrate something that our series denounced: the unacceptable role played by rumors in determining the fate of nations and businesses.”

And an anonymous executive from the Mail on Sunday has denied any knowledge of the Le Monde series, according to the New York Times:

Neither the paper’s reporters nor its sources had been aware of “End of the Line for the Euro,” the executive said.

The source of the speculation is now subject to an investigation by the French regulator. Société Générale said:

“Regarding the unfounded rumors circulating on the bank, Société Générale received the public apology from the Mail on Sunday, recognizing that their article was not true, and the group made a request to the A.M.F. — which was accepted — to open an enquiry into the origin of these irresponsible rumors."

(hat-tip to Regret the Error)

Mail on Sunday apologises to Dave Prentis

From today's Mail on Sunday:

Last Sunday we said that Dave Prentis, the Unison general secretary, had secured a 31 per cent increase to his pension contributions from the union. This was incorrect. In fact as a member of the Unison staff pension scheme, Mr Prentis is paying the increase himself under the union’s ‘salary sacrifice’ scheme. We apologise to Mr Prentis for our mistake and for any distress caused.

Liz Jones and an 'emergency'

Last Sunday, the Mail's Liz Jones announced she was off to cover the famine in East Africa.

For someone who has spent £26,000 on a bat sanctuary, £9 on tubes of toothpaste and had a homeopathic vet for her chickens, and then complained she was in debt, it seems an odd assignment.

But as ever with Jones, it wasn't about the people suffering in Africa. It was about her suffering:

on Friday morning, I found I needed the NHS for the first time in about 20 years, and it let me down. Very badly.

Jones was flying out on Monday. On Thursday, she went to her private GP in London to get some jabs she needed before she could get her visa. But he couldn't give her all of them in one day. So, back home in Somerset on Friday, she thought she would phone her local GP - one she has never used or even bothered to register with - and tell them she had an 'emergency':

'Hello!' I said cheerily. 'I am not registered with you, but I live two miles away. I wonder if you could possibly squeeze me in today to complete my jabs for travelling to Africa, and fill in my malaria prescription, as I need to start taking the tablets on Sunday.'

'You are not registered?!' the woman said, clearly appalled I had made her pick up the phone. 'We can't see you then. And we can't fill out a prescription that hasn't been written up by us.'

'But I will pay for the jabs, it only takes a couple of minutes.'

'But the nurse is fully booked. She can't do it. I don't even know if we have the drugs.'

'Can you find out?'

'Well, no. I'd have to ask her. And she can't fit you in.'

'But this is an emergency. I have never bothered you before in the three years I have lived here. Not with a snotty-nosed kid, not with depression, nothing. Never!'

'But we don't have your notes.'

'You don't need my notes. Lots of people go to walk-in centres. You could telephone my doctor if you're worried about anything.'

'I don't have time to do that. Why don't you go to A&E if it's an emergency?'

'I'm sure they wouldn't classify a routine jab as an emergency. I mean, it's a global crisis. Millions of people are dying and you won't put yourself out to allow me to be seen by a nurse, not even a doctor, for five minutes?'

'No.'

Outraged at not being able to jump to the front of the queue ahead of people who were actually registered and already had appointments, she then mentions abuse in a care home in Bristol as if that, and her treatment, were similar:

I always wonder why people who don't like people go into the caring professions. The problems in the health service and in privately-run homes are not always to do with money. Attitude is often the issue.

Turning back to the receptionist, she adds:

What would it have cost this woman on Friday morning to have said: 'Sod the protocol – everyone needs to know about this famine, Miss Jones, so I am going to speak to the GP and see what we can do.'

'Everyone needs to know about this famine' - in other words, until Liz Jones writes about it, no one will. This despite widespread coverage across all media, and television appeals by the Disasters Emergency Committee.

Somewhat inevitably, a spoof account was started on Twitter. @LizJonesSomalia is written by the person behind the (spoof, but at times it's hard to tell) Daily Mail Reporter account. But it hasn't just been set up for laughs:

I’m doing this for charity now. I want your money.

If you’ve enjoyed the feed so far, and have replied or RT’d then perhaps you’d consider a donation for the DEC East Africa Appeal?...Tell me that’s not the perfect harnessing of social media?

At time of writing, the total raised so far has been over £22,000. And this on the day that Richard Littlejohn has said Twitter 'mobs' are:

motivated by spite, envy and resentment

(See also: a line-by-line analysis of Jones' article by nurse Brian Kellet.)

Mail: 'One in four' = 42%

On page 25 of yesterday's Mail, and on their website, was a story about a Macmillan Cancer Support press release that claimed 42% of Britons will suffer with cancer at some point in their life.

The Mail can not resist a cancer story, of course, but didn't get the figures right:


Technically, the article by Sophie Borland is right - 42% is 'more than one in four'. But it's not clear why anyone thought one in four is the same as 42%.

Almost two days after the story first appeared, the Mail website have now corrected the figures to 'four in ten'.

(Hat-tip to Kat Arney)

No, Mr Dacre, I expect you to apologise

Today, the Mail has published the following apology to James Bond producer Barbara Broccoli:

Further to our August 15 and 16 articles "Axed film quango gave £70m to own members" and "Charity that really must start at home", we wish to clarify that it was never our intention to suggest that Barbara Broccoli had awarded herself a huge grant or indeed any grant of public money or had misused any funds. We accept that the grant was properly made to a registered youth film-making charity, First Light, of which Ms Broccoli is unpaid chair of trustees. We apologise to Ms Broccoli for any embarrassment.

What that apology doesn't make clear is that it comes with 'substantial undisclosed libel damages'.

The Press Gazette explains:

The action stems from a story headlined: "Axed film quango gave £70m to own members" which appeared in the Mail on Sunday on 15 August, 2010. According to a statement read out in open court yesterday, the allegation was repeated the following day in the Daily Mail's Peter McKay column under the heading: "Charity that really must start at home"...

Her solicitor Michael Skrein, from Reed Smith, said: "So, she did not award herself or her own company any grant whilst a board member of the UK Film Council and she has not misused public funds.

"The offending publications were deeply upsetting to the claimant and her family and harmful to her reputation."

The court heard that the allegations were repeated elsewhere online, including on The Guardian's Comment Is Free website.

The Guardian adds a further comment from Skrein:

Associated had made clear that it had no intention to accuse Broccoli of any wrongdoing and had made an offer of amends – which involved payment of substantial damages, which she intended to pass to First Light, and her legal costs, and the publication of apologies.

Mail on Sunday attacks BBC for word they didn't actually broadcast

Last month, an attempt by the Mail on Sunday to attack the BBC (over Tim Henman's Wimbledon fee) backfired when they were forced to withdraw the inaccurate story a week later.

But they're never going to give up attacking the BBC so they have dug up what journalists Chris Hastings and Steve Farrell call a 'decency row' involving a joke on a Radio 4 comedy show. The paper thinks this is such an important story, it's their front page lead:

The BBC was at the centre of a new decency row last night after ruling that the most offensive word in English is acceptable for broadcast.

The Corporation decided that the word – most abhorrent to women – has lost much of its 'shock value' and is tolerable for radio and television.

An executive who cleared it for daytime transmission on flagship Radio 4 even said it would 'delight' many of its audience, who would 'love it’.

Firstly, there was no decency row 'last night'. The twelfth paragraph of the article reveals that the joke in question was broadcast on an episode of The News Quiz in October last year. At the time, a retired newspaper executive complained to the BBC. After going through the complaints process, and various appeals, his complaint was rejected - and so he seems to have sent all the correspondence to the Mail on Sunday.

According to the article, the BBC has decided the c-word is 'tolerable for radio'. It was 'cleared for daytime transmission', the paper says.

They bolster their case with critical quotes from MP John Whittingdale:

'The vast majority of people still regard this an offensive term and it should not have been broadcast at this time.'

And, inevitably, from Mediawatch-UK:

'This is still an offensive term and is in fact one of the only truly offensive terms we have left. It should not have been broadcast at this time.'

All of which very strongly suggests the c-word was said on this show. Indeed, the paper explains:

The Mail on Sunday feels it is necessary to the reporting of the story to repeat the joke, and apologises in advance for any offence caused.

OK. Everyone sitting down, braced for the shock?

Miss [Sandi] Toksvig said: 'It's the Tories who have put the 'n' into cuts.'

No!

Wait.

What?

So the word wasn't actually broadcast on The News Quiz, then? No.

But didn't the article say the the BBC had made a 'ruling [that] the word is acceptable for broadcast'?

It takes the Mail on Sunday eleven paragraphs to repeat the joke and up until that point it very clearly implies the c-word was actually uttered at 6.30pm. It wasn't.

So rude word not actually broadcast on radio. They decided to hold the front page for that.

Yet the final line of the article might just give away what the paper is up to:

Ofcom said its own research confirmed the word was still regarded as highly offensive, adding that it would investigate any complaint made to it.

So despite the Mail calling Ofcom 'toothless' and 'pathetic' on Saturday, the Mail on Sunday appears keen to get its readers to complain to the regulator - particularly because the BBC will be on the receiving end.

Elsewhere in the paper, Peter Hitchens also has his say about this (non) issue in his column. He writes:

Every few weeks a reader writes to me to tell me that the BBC has brushed aside a reasonable complaint. They send me the fat-bottomed, complacent responses, and they share with me their frustration that, in the end, the BBC is accountable to nobody.

He accuses the BBC of replying to complaints with:

smug, unhelpful responses

and:

crass, unresponsive statements

Clearly, when it comes to dealing with complaints, the BBC needs to take lessons from the Mail, the Mail on Sunday, and their owners, Associated Newspapers.

For example, Michael Parkinson said:

'I believe that the persistent delaying tactics of the Daily Mail were both unattractive and unworthy of a national newspaper...it should not have taken nine months nor been so difficult for the editor to apologise promptly.'

Or how about the Mail's response when Richard Littlejohn claimed:

Most robberies in this country have been carried out by Eastern European gangs.

They didn't reply with crass or smug statements to a reader who complained - because for six weeks, they didn't reply at all. And when they did, they tried to every tactic they could think of to dilute the wording of the apology.

Then there was Richard Wilson's lengthy effort to get a clarification from the Mail over a column on asbestos. Wilson wrote:

After a delay of several weeks, the PCC forwarded me a dismissive response from the Daily Mail's executive managing editor, Robin Esser. While acknowledging some minor errors, Esser insisted that the disputed HSE study did indeed back up Booker's views on asbestos. The fact that the HSE had put out a statement explicitly rebutting this merely proved that "those responsible for HSE press releases are similarly unable to grasp the significance of findings published by their own statisticians". For good measure, Esser accused me (falsely, just in case you're wondering) of being "allied to a well-organised and well-funded commercial lobby", who "stand to benefit financially" from the "anti-asbestos campaign".

He adds:

More time-consuming exchanges followed, with long gaps in between, while we awaited a response from the Daily Mail. In the end we won, sort of...But to get even this far has taken seven months, and a substantial time investment, while the Daily Mail seems to have been able to drag the process out with impunity.

What about the experience of Juliet Shaw:

they stood by their article and told me that they would not enter into any further correspondence with me and considered the matter closed.

And Cherie Blair:

Associated Newspapers failed to provide a full and unequivocal apology, or even to give a substantive response to her complaint

And Sophie Dahl:

she is seeking aggravated damages, in part, as the paper failed to apologise to her or respond to a letter of complaint.

Dismissive, unhelpful and accountable to nobody, indeed...

Mail on Sunday retracts story on Henman's BBC fee

Mail on Sunday, 15 May 2011:


Mail on Sunday, 22 May 2011:

On May 15 we said Tim Henman was being paid £200,000 by the BBC for commentating at Wimbledon this year. In fact we have been informed that his fee will be substantially less than that. We apologise for the mistake and are happy to set the record straight.

The original claims were repeated by the Express, Mirror and Star, but while they have all deleted their articles, the Mail on Sunday (by Lara Gould) one remains online.

Pippa, privacy and perving

On Monday, the Guardian revealed that the Middleton's had complained to the Press Complaints Commission on the issue of privacy:

...after five-year-old photographs of Kate and Pippa Middleton and their mother, Carole, in bikinis while on holiday with Prince William on board a yacht off Ibiza were published in four newspapers.

The pictures, in the Mail on Sunday, Daily Mail, News of the World and Daily Mirror showed the Middletons swimming, diving and sunbathing. The News of the World also showed Pippa Middleton removing her bikini top with the headlines "Oh buoy it's Pippa" and "So hot she had to be hosed down." Further photographs were displayed for a time on the newspaper's website but later taken down.

Undeterred, today's Daily Star devotes 576 words to....Pippa Middleton's bum. Or, as middle-aged hack Nigel Pauley refers to it in his leering article, the 27-year old's:

biggest ass-et.

Their front page includes a close-up shot of her bum - taken from one of the holiday photos mentioned above - accompanied by the headline 'So bot's happened to perky Pippa?':


The article is shockingly bad:

Fans fear Her Royal Hotness Pippa Middleton is in danger of losing her biggest ass-et. They believe her rear end is performing its own VIP disappearing act as she seeks a more slimline figure.

...her fans fear the posh totty is losing her famous botty as the weight seems to have tumbled off the 27-year-old since her big sister Kate’s wedding. Pippa had been seen as a shoe-in to land this year’s coveted Rear Of The Year award.

But now her chances are disappearing, along with her curves. She has returned from a sunshine holiday and yesterday looking tanned but trim as she left hairdresser Richard Ward’s salon in Chelsea.

One of her bottom’s biggest fans said: “Pippa’s top of the botts but is definitely looking a lot more trim in recent days.

“It would be a tragedy if her slimline figure results in her losing her best asset, which is definitely her gorgeous behind.”

So Pauley has trawled the internet and (allegedly) found one person to quote on this all-important topic. But how has this anonymous person (from an unnamed website) seen her in 'recent days' if she's been on holiday?

And can 'the weight' really have 'tumbled off' her in the two weeks since the wedding? Well, not according to the pictures published in today's Sun, in which she looks much the same. Indeed, the Sun claims Pippa is looking 'ripper' and is 'sure to gain more admirers in this outfit'.

They also include a quote from an anoynmous 'onlooker' and a photo of Pippa's bum, cropping her head out of the photo just to be clear where their interest lies:


As Steve Baxter says in his New Statesman column:

It seems that P-Middy's derriere has achieved iconic status after appearing at the royal wedding - so much so that the lady, the human being with a soul, to whom it belongs is becoming somewhat dehumanised...

We don't need a face, or eyes, or a person attached to it. This is the arse that rules the world - or our popular culture, anyway...

Is this what it's come to? A whole person's life boiled down to their bum?

Back to the Star, which also devotes a 100-word editorial comment to this non-story:

Pippa Middleton has been a great role model for Brit girls. She’s well educated, polite, caring, is planning her own business and has impressed the world with her beautiful curves. She showed impeccable decorum during the royal wedding. And as a result is a wholesome English rose the whole of Britain can be proud of.

But “her royal hotness” is now looking a little too slim. And she’s in danger of losing the famous bottom that has earned praise across the globe. Please don’t get too skinny Pippa. You’re perfect the way you are. And a real inspiration to young women everywhere.

Isn't it strange how that anonymous internet fan seems to think the same as the Star's editorial?

'Educated, polite and caring' she may be, but the paper has already declared that her 'biggest ass-et' is her, err, ass. This follows a series of Star articles where she's been called 'sexy' and 'queen of the hotties' with a 'banging body' and the 'phwoar factor'.

Yes, it's clearly her education they're interested in...

Sorry we said you received special treatment

Two weeks ago, the Mail on Sunday ran a story with the headline: 'The seven months pregnant woman told to give up her British Airways seat… just so Gordon Brown could fly Club Class'.

They trailed their 'exclusive' on the front page, with the main article on page five. The paper wrote:

Gordon Brown sparked a mutiny on a British Airways flight after he was blamed for an attempt to downgrade a heavily pregnant woman and Red Cross doctor into more cramped seats. The extraordinary scenes – dubbed Mutiny On The Brown-ty - unfolded on a flight from Abu Dhabi to London

The paper fails to mention who (in the Mail's newsroom) dubbed it 'Mutiny on the Brown-ty'.

The article included much sound and fury, as did the editorial:

We have pretty much put an end to privilege. The good things in life are obtained through hard work and effort, not through rank and status...

In a contest for a comfortable seat, between a woman a few weeks from giving birth and a man whose undistinguished period in office is already being happily forgotten, most people would know instantly which side to take.

But BA, and Gordon Brown’s aggressive and charmless aide, seem not to have realised this. In fact, a little diplomacy and good manners by the airline and Mr Brown’s assistant might well have resolved the problem.

Equality is a slogan Mr Brown uses plentifully. But it seems he prefers the theory to the practice.

Yet the paper also had a statement from British Airways which seemed to cast some doubt on their version of events:

A spokeswoman for the airline said Mr Brown’s arrival on the flight was a coincidence, and he had been unfairly blamed by the mutinous passengers.

‘The situation had absolutely nothing to do with Gordon Brown,’ she said. ‘We have apologised to [the complainant] and we have offered to pay compensation.

‘It is very rare for a customer not to be able to travel in the cabin that they have booked and we are extremely sorry that this happened on this flight. Gordon Brown and his party were booked in advance and were not involved in any way.’

And:

Mr Brown's office was contacted on Friday. Yesterday afternoon, his spokeswoman sent a text message saying 'I assume you have read the BA statement and are now not ­running the story', making it clear that BA and the former PM's office had been in discussions.

She released a statement that said: 'As BA has made clear, the arrangements were nothing to do with Mr Brown, who had booked his flight and seats well in advance and made no requests for - nor received - any special treatment.

'As BA will confirm, all questions about bookings, overbookings and allocations of seats are not - and could not be - a matter for Mr Brown but for British Airways.'

Despite all that, the paper decided to run the story, with a front page teaser, anyway.

One week later, the Mail on Sunday had an 'update':

Gordon Brown

Last week we published a story headlined ‘The seven months pregnant woman told to give up her British Airways seat…just so Gordon Brown could fly Club Class’ and an editorial.

The flight was overbooked but we accept that neither Gordon Brown nor his staff received any special treatment from British Airways, nor behaved in any way improperly.

We apologise to Gordon Brown and Kirsty McNeill.

The apology appeared on page five. This time, there was no trail on the front page.

(More from Angry Mob here and here, Shouting at Cows and Press Reform)

Recommended reading on Liz Jones and Jo Yeates

From Jonathan at No Sleep 'Til Brooklands:

Of all the the journalists in Britain you would want to write about the Joanna Yeates murder, Liz Jones is probably nestling somewhere near the bottom of the list. You might think, after all, that Jones' penchant for consumerist superficiality and ill-directed moaning doesn't quite carry the gravitas required to really deal with such a case of genuine human tragedy and emotion. Well, you'd be right.

Jones' crass, can't-quite-believe-it's-for-real article, from yesterday's Mail on Sunday, includes such vacuous 'insights' as:

It's Friday night and I’m in the Ram bar on Park Street in Bristol.

This is where Joanna Yeates spent her last evening...

The bar is OK but ordinary. The wine list, chalked on a board, says ‘Lauren Perrier’.

I wish she had spent what were probably her last hours on earth somewhere lovelier.

And:

I find Tesco, and go in. I almost buy that upmarket pizza; the choice tells me Jo wanted a lovely life, something above the ordinary.

She goes on to cover antique street lights and trying to pay the Clifton Suspension Bridge toll with a designer button, which doesn't work. Could anyone, anyone, link that non-event with Yeates' murder? Jones can:

Isn’t it interesting that you can snatch a young woman’s life away from her in the most violent, painful, frightening way possible, take away her future children, her future Christmases, take away everything she loves, and yet there are elaborate systems in place to ensure you do not cross a bridge for only 30 pence?

Jonathan notes:

Well...no. No, that isn't interesting. It's irrelevant, facile and absurd. Bridge tolls are no more relevant to this murder than the tooth fairy is. There is no sad irony, no lingering meaning to be found here...[it's] possibly the weirdest paragraph I have ever read in a national newspaper column.

Other bloggers commenting on Jones' piece include Anton Vowl and Shouting At Cows.

Mail on Sunday gets it wrong on US broadcast of 'Downton Abbey'

A couple of days ago, the spirit of Richard Littlejohn's 'Chad Hanging' seemed to influence this Mail on Sunday article by Chris Hastings:


Hastings claimed that when ITV series Downton Abbey is screened in America next week it is 'feared':

...viewers will be left baffled...the beautifully nuanced portrait of pre-First World War upper-class life could prove just a little too complex for the trans­atlantic audience...in the land of the notoriously short attention span.

As a result, Downton, which ran for eight hours on ITV, has been slashed to six for the States.

So the running time has been 'slashed' by two hours? Yet later in the article, Hastings says that Rebecca Eaton, an executive producer for the PBS network (which is broadcasting the series):

insisted that any changes were minor and did not affect the quality of the programme.

A 'minor' change of cutting two hours? That doesn't sound right. And it isn't.

According to Jace Lacob, the TV Columnist of the Daily Beast, who was interviewed (and ignored) by Hastings:

To put it bluntly: it's simply not true.

While I would be incensed about the article to begin with--given that Hastings took up my time on vacation, interrupted me incessantly while I was answering his questions, refused to listen to me, clearly had an agenda of his own, and then had the temerity to quote my review without proper attribution--I'm most angry about the fact that I actually did the math for Hastings during the interview, demonstrating in no uncertain terms that there weren't two hours missing from the US broadcast of the series.

The only thing missing here are, in fact, the commercials themselves...

Let's take a closer look. PBS is airing Downton Abbey as four 90-minute episodes, bringing it to a run-time of roughly 6 hours. Removing the ad breaks, ITV's run of Downton Abbey ran for--wait for it--roughly six hours. (Two episodes ran as 60 minute installments, while five ran for 45 minutes excluding the commercials)...

The numbers that Hastings was using to make his case about widespread cuts failed to take into account the commercials, which don't air on PBS, even though he himself admits this in his piece.

Although there will be some minor edits (some to accommodate the change in the number of episodes), the missing two hours are, essentially, the ad breaks. It's not about the 'intricate plot' being removed to stop viewers being 'baffled'.

Also in the article, Hastings sneers:

PBS also believes its audiences will need an American to outline the key themes of the show. So before the first episode, actress Laura Linney will explain the inheritance principle.

In fact, Downton Abbey is being broadcast in PBS' Masterpiece strand which has been hosted by Amercians and Brits for forty years. Linney happens to present Masterpiece Classic, which is showing Downton. Lacob points out:

First, Masterpiece's hosts typically do explore the historical and social contexts for the series...Nothing new there as Linney is performing the same role that all of Masterpiece's hosts ably step into before each episode of a program.

Second, Linney might be American but her fellow hosts--among them, past and present, David Tennant, Alan Cumming, Matthew Goode, etc.--are not. So I'm not sure what to make of the "Americans need Americans to explain things to them" comment, which just comes across as ill-informed and mean-spirited.

Lacob also describes Hastings' article as 'messy' and 'wrong-headed' and said later it would be the 'last time I talk to a tab'. Given he told the truth about the running time and Hastings decided - for whatever reason - to ignore it, who can blame him?

(Hat-tip to Peter Bulkeley)

Mail on Sunday clarifies 'clash' claim

The Mail on Sunday has been brought to the attention of the PCC again - this time over a 'clash' between the current Speaker of the House of Commons and his predecessor, Michael Martin. Here's the clarification they published yesterday:

On July 4 we said Lord Martin of Springburn, the former Speaker of the House of Commons, had ‘clashed' with John Bercow, the present Speaker, over the dismissal of the Speaker's Secretary Angus Sinclair.

In fact Lord Martin has not written or spoken to the Speaker on this matter and we have been asked to make clear he has, at no time, clashed with Mr Speaker on this, or any other, issue.

Sorry we said you were a fraudster

An apology from the Mail on Sunday:

Mr Alan Scott

On December 27, 2009, we reported that a Mr Alan Scott, an electrical engineer from North Shields and former chief executive of a company called Alternative Diesel Investments, had admitted charges of fraud at Ipswich Crown Court.

We have been asked to point out that this person's correct full name is Robert Allan Scott, from Newmarket, Suffolk, and is entirely different and unrelated to Alan Scott, managing director of the Sunderland-based Renewable Fuels and Plastics Ltd.

We apologise for any difficulties this may have caused for Mr Alan Scott and his company.

Mail keeps PCC and ASA busy

The PCC has published details of another apology printed by the Daily Mail:

On March 28 an article headed ‘The £450m Rothschild heiress and the ex-crack addict scriptwriter...’ referred to Sacha Gervasi, the award-winning film director, screenwriter and producer.

In fact, Mr Gervasi was never addicted to crack cocaine and never had a £200-a-day drug habit.

He met Ms Jessica de Rothschild at a stage premiere and not through pitching a film idea to her production company.

Their families are not concerned about the relationship. We apologise for any embarrassment caused.

Looking through the list of recently resolved cases on the PCC website, it seems that once again the Mail, plus its Sunday and Scottish editions are still responsible for a vast number of complaints. Of the last 30 'resolved cases', 10 are complaints about a Mail title and five are about the Sun or News of the World.

No other publication has more than two.

Yet Paul Dacre, Editor-in-Chief at the Mail, is still Chair of the Editor's Code Committee, which oversees the Code of Practice.

And it's not just the PCC that has to deal with them. Today the Advertising Standards Agency ruled a Daily Mail promotion for £15 holidays breached clauses on 'substantiation' and 'truthfulness'. On three counts, they found the Mail had been 'misleading'.

Like the PCC, the ASA doesn't have any meaningful powers of punishment, so the Mail has been told not to run the advert again. But since the offer ends on 10 September, it was never likely to anyway.

That'll teach them.

Sorry we said you idolised Abu Hamza, and other apologies

Back on 13 April, this blog highlighted the Sun's claim that footballer Marlon King had converted to Islam in prison and was idolising tabloid hate-figure Abu Hamza. The second bit, in particular, sounded very suspicious. Nonetheless, the Mail mindlessly churned out its own version of the Sun's story.

The Sun removed the story within a day. And now the Mail has written:

An article on 12 April referred to reports which suggested Marlon King had converted to Islam in prison, his hero was hate preacher Abu Hamza and cocaine had been found in his cell.

In fact, these reports were untrue and we apologise for any contrary impression that may have been given.

Firstly, it appears from a search of the Sun's website that they haven't apologised yet.

Secondly, it also appears to be another good example of the lies newspapers try to get away when the subject is in prison - there have been recent examples about Peter Sutcliffe and Boy George.

Finally, it's well known that newspapers use weasel words in apologies and clarifications, but 'contrary impression'? Really?

Given that all the Mail had done is 'suggest' all this was true under the headline:

Marlon King: Shamed Wigan star converts to Islam and names himself after hero Abu Hamza

it's hard to imagine how people got that 'contrary impression', isn't it?

And that's not the only football-related 'contrary impression' the Mail newspapers have been apologising for recently, this one from the Mail on Sunday:

Our story of February 21 ‘Chelsea helped Cole to silence claims of affair’, may have suggested that Chelsea FC and Steve Atkins, Head of Communications, encouraged a woman to lie by denying, falsely, that she had slept with a player.

In fact, there was no encouragement to lie and any advice was given to the woman in good faith on the understanding that the allegations were untrue. We apologise to Mr Atkins and Chelsea for any contrary impression given.

The Sun has also been issuing apologies about coverage of Ashley Cole's private life - this one to wife Cheryl:

As part of our coverage of the break-up of Cheryl and Ashley Cole's marriage we reported on March 4 that the singer would fly to France to meet her estranged husband who was texting her lines from her songs.

We accept Cheryl did not fly to France, no such texts were sent and she denies saying she was scared of life as a single girl as we reported on March 1. We are happy to set the record straight and apologise to Cheryl.

And back to the Mail for one more apology, this one to Vanessa Perroncel:

On January 31, we published some personal information about Vanessa Perroncel concerning an alleged affair with the footballer John Terry. We have since been informed she would have preferred this to remain private and it was untrue in any case. We apologise to Miss Perroncel for any distress caused.

Shock as EU says: 'You can still buy a dozen eggs if you want'

The Mail on Sunday's front page headline was one of those you see and just know is probably not true:


It's a tabloid favourite - look at what those meddling Europeans are trying to ban now. The last notable example was the Express' 'ban' on milk jugs which the paper eventually admitted was total rubbish.

But it says much about the attitude to the EU that a newspaper thinks this is both true and a front page story. Inevitably, many people who also hate the EU start to believe it too.

But the EU is to ban people buying eggs by the dozen? Really? You mean we won't be able to go anywhere and buy 12 eggs?

Who can seriously believe that?

Well, Iain Dale, for one. He claimed the story was 'well-sourced' and even stooped so low as to say 'you really couldn't make it up'.

Sigh.

He added that, in future, we definitely won't be able to buy limes individually either. How can anyone think that you won't be able to go and buy one lime if you want to?

Back to the article and Mail on Sunday hack Christopher Leake wrote:

British shoppers are to be banned from buying eggs by the dozen under new regulations approved by the European Parliament.

For the first time, eggs and ­other products such as oranges and bread rolls will be sold by weight instead of by the number contained in a packet.

So even if you accept that this is what the proposed EU regulations say (it's not), the idea that someone would go and pick up a six-egg-shaped box of eggs and not know there are six eggs inside, because the packet has 372g on the side, defies belief.

The Mail on Sunday tried to pretend that all this will add a burden to the industry as all eggs will have to weighed but, as John Band has pointed out, eggs are already classified by their weight anyway. Moreover, NoseMonkey has explained that the resolution 'makes precisely no mention of outlawing selling by numbers'.

Yet other media outlets regurgitated the story, including the Telegraph, BBC, Mirror and Sun.

Then the Mail added fuel to the fire, with two follow-up stories by Steve Doughty: Leave our eggs alone Tories warn Brussels and We won't let Brussels stop you buying eggs by the dozen, ministers promise.

But just after 11am this morning, the European Parliament issued a statement:

MEPs are neither trying to ban the sale of eggs by the dozen nor the sale or marketing of Nutella. MEP Renate Sommer, who is steering legislation on food labelling through the European Parliament, said, "There will be no changes to selling foods by number. Selling eggs by the dozen, for example, will not be banned."

'Selling eggs by the dozen will not be banned'. That's odd given the Mail on Sunday very clearly said:


The European Parliament statement continued:

No ban on eggs by the dozen
Selling eggs by the dozen will not be illegal under the terms of the amendments adopted by the European Parliament to EU food labelling proposals. Labels will still be able to indicate the number of food items in a pack, whether of eggs, bread rolls or fish fingers.

Labelling by weight
Reports that claim the new rules will not allow both the weight and the quantity to be displayed are also wrong. The new food labelling regulation does not affect existing EU rules on the size of eggs: There are four official sizes of eggs: very large (73g and over), large (63g to 73g), medium (53g to 63g), and small (under 53g) - this will not change.

That statement emerged almost exactly nine hours ago (at time of writing). And yet, in sharp contrast to the three articles about the ban, the Mail hasn't apparently found the time to produce an article containing the very clear denial from the EU.

So will they do the honourable thing and correct the false impression?

Or will they conveniently 'forget' - as they did with the case of the boy who wasn't thrown off a bus for wearing an England shirt - and let their readers continue to believe that the EU really are banning the sale of eggs by the dozen. Even when they know that's simply not true.

UPDATE (Wednesday) - Well, the Mail did publish an article at 5:23am saying 'eggs by the dozen will NOT be banned'. But rather than admit they got it completely wrong, they have tried to save face and claim the u-turn came about in the face of a 'backlash by Britain' - making it seem as if the 'outrage' caused by the Mail on Sunday article changed their minds.

This article hasn't made the front page of today's paper (as the original did) and is also buried half-way down the website homepage - unlike the original which was top story, or close to it, for most of Sunday.

Wow

Yesterday, the Mail on Sunday ran this stunning exposé, unbelievably credited to two journalists:


Yes, they really managed to squeeze 120 words out of a woman wearing her daughter's hat to Ascot.

But the website of the Telegraph - Newspaper of the Year, remember - thought it was a good enough story to repeat:


They won't be winning any prizes for second-hand stories about second-hand hats.

(Hat-tip to Jim Hawkins)

Recommended reading - links

Angry Mob looks at the Daily Mail's latest article on the 'exaggerated' and 'vastly over-stated' swine flu 'pandemic that never was' - conveniently forgetting their own headline such as 'How swine flu could be a bigger threat to humanity than nuclear warfare'.

Martin Moore from Media Standards Trust considers the backlash against the Mail on Sunday for its article about Lord Triesman. Last week, the News of the World's managing editor revealed that they turned down the story on the basis that it was 'too thin.' Too thin for the News of the World? Hard to imagine, isn't it?

Janet Street-Porter recently joined the lengthy list of Mail columnists who have written some ill-considered rubbish and suffered a backlash. Her 'Depression? It's just the trendy new illness!' was castigated by Musings of a phenomenologist, Andrew Brown in the Telegraph and three mental health charities, among many others.

Sian Norris and Dr Helen Mott were labelled 'hypocrites' by the Evening Post after they raised objections to a burlesque performance at Bristol Museum. After they complained the front-page story had completely misrepresented their views, the online article was removed and Norris and Mott were given a right of reply - a two-page spread on pages 16 and 17. It is good that the paper gave them the opportunity to give their side of the story over two pages.

The Media Blog has written (two posts) about the Mail on Sunday's latest attack on the interwebs and claims that firms are 'spying' on people through what they say on Twitter and Facebook. More from Martin Belam and Peter Kirwan, who was himself contacted by someone from the Mail via Twitter because of his comments - exactly what the Mail was complaining about...

In a longer post about the media and Cumbria, Matt Gardner looks at yet another feeble Georgina Littlejohn article on the Mail website about Lady Gaga and how she (apparently...) insulted the victims of Derrick Bird's rampage.

Five Chinese Crackers suggests a Sun front page headline beginning with the words 'Cannibal cops' may give the wrong impression.

Some other Mail-related fisking by Angry Mob:

• 'live' grenades at the Dad's Army play that weren't actually live
• shamelessly dragging 'health and safety' into the Cumbria shootings
• criticising a school for closing early for the World Cup
• a useless bit of churnalism about dating
• swallowing a story about a baby being stamped on
• a 'first look' at James McAvoy in the 'new X-Men' film which happens to be a still from a completely different film from two years ago

And finally, from Adam Bienkov, a picture taken back in April of two Sunday newspapers (both from the same stable) who couldn't quite decide which way Cheryl And Ashley Cole's marriage was going to go: