Churnalism to sell holidays, cheese, toothpaste, sandwiches...

As well as helping to uncover the extent of phone hacking at the News of the World, Nick Davies also brought 'churnalism' to people's attention. Davies wrote in the Press Gazette in 2008:

Where once we were active gatherers of news, we have become passive processors of second-hand material generated by the booming PR industry and a handful of wire agencies, most of which flows into our stories without being properly checked. The relentless impact of commercialisation has seen our journalism reduced to mere churnalism...

All local and regional media outlets in Britain - print and broadcast - have been swamped by a tide of churnalism. The scale and quality of coverage has been swept away. But the tide has not stopped in the provinces. The big national outlets can still support some real journalism, but here too, churnalism has swept through newsrooms.

Despite Mail editor Paul Dacre telling a parliamentary Select Committee that he 'refutes' the charge of churnalism at his paper, it and others still rely on PR to fill their pages. Flick through any newspaper on any day and you will usually find at least one story based on 'surveys' designed to get a company's name in the paper. Here are a few recent examples:

* Today, the Mail and Express are reporting that women pack too many items when they go away on holiday.

And which company conducted the survey of 2,000 women and would be interested in reminding people what essentials they need for their holidays?

Go Compare Travel insurance.

* Yesterday, the Mail and the Star reported that half our smiles are fake.

And which company conducted the survey of 3,000 people and would be interested in reminding people about their smiles?

'Toothpaste maker Biorepair'.

* On 6 July, the Express reported that 'one in seven Britons had laughed at a funeral'.

And which company conducted the survey of 2,000 people and would have an interest in reminding people about laughing?

'The Laughing Cow cheese company'.

* Also on 6 July, the Mail reported that people 'don't trust' dishwashers but found washing up by hand 'therapeutic'.

And which company conducted the survey of 3,000 people and would have an interest in reminding people about cleaning their home?

Vileda ('leaders in cleaning equipment').

* On 4 July, the Mail ran the headline 'Early lunch? The midday break is now a snack at 11am for workers'.

And which company conducted the survey of 2,000 people and would have an interest in reminding people about food at lunch time?

'Sandwich chain Subway'.

* On 29 June, the Mail ran the headline 'The end of the postcard: Facebook and texts mean 4 in 10 British holidaymakers no longer send notes to loved-ones'. The Express carried the same story, but not until 4 July.

And which company conducted the survey of 2,000 people and would have an interest in reminding people about their holidays?

'Online travel firm ebookers'.

* Also on 4 July, the Express reported that 'Women are so nifty in their fifties'.

And which company conducted the survey of 2,000 people and would have an interest in telling people how great life is after someone reaches 50?

Yours - the magazine for over 50s.

* On 10 June, the Mirror and the Express both reported that that day was the 'top day for sickies' as it was 'one of the busiest days for booking summer holidays'.

And which company conducted the survey and would have an interest in reminding people about booking a break?

'Travel website laterooms.com'.

* On 29 June, the Daily Mail reported that despite iPads, DVDs and computers, listening to the radio made people happiest.

And which company conducted the survey of 1,000 people and would have an interest in reminding people about how much people enjoy listening to the radio?

The Radio Advertising Bureau ('our aim is to encourage advertisers and agencies to consider radio more often as part of their communications solutions').

And on and on it goes...

Chris Atkins showed in February how easy it is for 'churnalism' to slip into the papers unchecked when several stories he had invented were regurgitated without question.

Because, as Davies reported in Flat Earth News:

80 per cent of [Fleet Street's news] is wholly, mainly or partially made up of second-hand material from PR and PA.

But that was one bit of research that many newspapers didn't want to report.

Putting upskirt photos on the front page, with the Daily Star

On 29 May, Richard Desmond's Daily Star Sunday took a stand against a 'sick' German newspaper that had published upskirt shots of Pippa Middleton:


'Pippa pervs' the front page roared as it criticised an:

undie-Hans attack by a kinky German snapper.

And here's Saturday's Daily Star front page:

Recommended reading: phone hacking denials

The Guardian has collected some of the very 'best' denials about phone hacking from News International, the police and the PCC.

For example, this News International statement from July 2009 following Nick Davies' first Guardian story on hacking:

"All of these irresponsible and unsubstantiated allegations against News of the World and other News International titles and its journalists are false."

And this from Rebekah Brooks:

"The Guardian coverage has, we believe, substantially and likley deliberately misled the British public."

Express takes on 'health fascists' over salt

Wednesday's Daily Express leads on yet another health story:


'Now salt is safe to eat: Health fascists proved wrong after lecturing us all for years' is a silly headline with an entirely inappropriate use of the word 'fascists'.

The article is another by the paper's health correspondent Jo Willey. She says:

Salt is safe to eat

Well, it always was, just in small doses.

Salt is safe to eat – and cutting our daily intake does nothing to lower the risk of suffering from heart disease, research shows.

For years, doctors have been telling us that too much salt is bad and official NHS guidance aims to speed up new measures to control how much we eat.

Yes, those 'fascist' doctors 'lecturing us all for years' about the dangers of too much salt - something the Express would never do...


Willey also says:

Earlier this year the Daily Express revealed how “nanny state” council bosses at Stockport Council banned salt shakers in fish and chip shops as part of a healthy living drive.

And she's right - the Express did run that story earlier this year. But it wasn't true then and it isn't true now. Neither the Council, nor anyone else, 'banned' salt from fish and chip shops in Stockport.

Willey goes on to describe the results of a study by Professor Rod Taylor at the University of Exeter:

this review has shown slashing our daily intake is not as beneficial as thought. People who cut the salt they ate by a small amount saw their blood pressure reduce after six months.

'Not as beneficial' is not the same as 'does nothing' - the claim made in the first paragraph of the article. And that reduction in blood pressure shows there clearly is a benefit.

Then one of Taylor's quotes goes further in suggesting the Express' angle isn't quite right:

He said: “We believe that we didn’t see big benefits in this study because the people in the trials we analysed only reduced their salt intake by a moderate amount, so the effect on blood pressure and heart disease was not large.”

But Willey's article contains no doubts about Taylor's research. Compare that to heartwire, which spoke to two people whose work Taylor included in his meta-analysis:

"The review by Taylor adds little to our knowledge about the health effects of sodium reduction," Dr Lawrence Appel (Johns Hopkins University Medical School, Baltimore, MD) told heartwire. None of the studies included were designed to test the effects of sodium-reduction interventions on CVD events and mortality, he says, and "even in aggregate, the number of events is small and the statistical power is limited."

And Dr Nancy Cook from Harvard Medical School said:

"This was a crude analysis of the results in these studies, and therefore loses information. In my view, several of the studies were misrepresented and the results of the review are not reliable."

Heartwire adds:

Taylor, himself, concedes that the review may have been underpowered.

They also quote Katharine Jenner from Consensus Action on Salt and Health:

"Contrary to the author's concluding headline—The Cochrane Library Press release announces, 'Cutting down on salt doesn't reduce your chance of dying,'—the review further demonstrates that reduced salt intake reduces blood pressure, [with them] stating that 'our findings are consistent with the belief that salt reduction is beneficial in normotensive and hypertensive people.'"

"It is very disappointing that the message from this small review indicates that salt reduction may not be beneficial; this is a completely inappropriate conclusion, given the strong evidence and the overwhelming public health consensus that salt raises blood pressure which leads to cardiovascular disease."

A 'completely inappropriate conclusion', but one that the Express has decided to splash all over the front page.

Telegraph journalist uses phone-hacking allegations to attack the BBC

David Hughes is the Daily Telegraph's chief leader writer and has, according to his blog, been covering British politics for over 30 years.

And what is his take on the revelations about the News of the World and the hacking of Milly Dowler's phone?

The BBC has pulled out all the stops in its coverage of allegations that a private investigator employed by the News of the World hacked into the mobile telephone of the murdered teenager Milly Dowler.

The story has dominated its bulletins; it is getting wall-to-wall coverage on the 24-hour news channel; and the Corporation’s editorial big guns have been wheeled out to explore the implications, political as well as commercial. While the allegations are – in David Cameron’s well-chosen words – “truly dreadful”, do they warrant this level of news overkill?

Those two words, borrowed from Cameron, are the only words Hughes uses to criticise the News of the World. But how can an experienced journalist fail to see that this is a serious, important story?

He adds:

The BBC’s treatment of the hacking story suggests the Corporation still sees the value of blackening the reputation of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire as thoroughly as possible whenever the opportunity arises.

Yes - according to him, it's the BBC that is 'blackening the reputation of Murdoch's empire' rather than, say, the actions of some people within that empire.

Hughes links the BBC coverage to the News Corporation's takeover of BSkyB:

The Corporation is bitterly opposed to News Corporation’s bid to to buy the 61% of BSkyB it doesn’t already own (as is much of Fleet Street). Indeed, it is so opposed that the BBC’s director general Mark Thompson took the extraordinary step last autumn of putting his name to a letter of protest objecting to the deal – for which he was forced to apologise by the BBC Trust.

But Hughes seems to forget two things. The Telegraph is also opposed to that takeover. Indeed, the letter that Thompson signed was also signed by:

Murdoch MacLennan, the chief executive of Telegraph Media group, publisher of the Daily Telegraph

As for the prominence of the BBC's reporting, it seems Hughes has conveniently missed that Sky News, Channel 4 News and ITN have been reporting these claims very prominently, and it was on the front of several newspapers today, including Murdoch's own Times.

And the paper Hughes works for:

'Despicable'

The saga of the phone-hacking by the News of the World took a shocking new twist today as the Guardian reported:

The News of the World illegally targeted the missing schoolgirl Milly Dowler and her family in March 2002, interfering with police inquiries into her disappearance, an investigation by the Guardian has established.

Scotland Yard is investigating the episode, which is likely to put new pressure on the then-editor of the paper, Rebekah Brooks, now Rupert Murdoch's chief executive in the UK; and the then deputy editor, Andy Coulson, who resigned in January as the prime minister's media adviser.

The Dowlers' family lawyer this afternoon issued a statement in which he described the News of the World's activities as "heinous" and "despicable". He told the BBC this afternoon the Dowler family was now pursuing a damages claim against the News of the World.

And if that wasn't enough:

In the last four weeks the Met officers have approached Surrey police and taken formal statements from some of those involved in the original inquiry, who were concerned about how News of the World journalists intercepted – and deleted – the voicemail messages of Milly Dowler.

The messages were deleted by journalists in the first few days after Milly's disappearance in order to free up space for more messages. As a result friends and relatives of Milly concluded wrongly that she might still be alive. Police feared evidence may have been destroyed...

The Dowler family then granted an exclusive interview to the News of the World in which they talked about their hope, quite unaware that it had been falsely kindled by the newspaper's own intervention.

The Dowler's lawyer, Mark Lewis, said:

"It is distress heaped upon tragedy to learn that the News of the World had no humanity at such a terrible time. The fact that they were prepared to act in such a heinous way that could have jeopardised the police investigation and give them false hope is despicable."

As Brian Cathcart notes:

If anyone still believed that the phone hacking scandal was “just” about celebrities, the allegation that the News of the World hacked Milly Dowler’s voicemails must lay the idea to rest.

No matter how ordinary and vulnerable you were, no matter how tragic your circumstances — in this case it was a missing, murdered Surrey schoolgirl — on this evidence you were a potential target for the Rupert Murdoch’s Sunday tabloid.

UPDATE: This development is the lead story on the front page of Tuesday's Guardian, Independent and Telegraph. It also makes the front page of the FT and the Times. The Express, Mail, Mirror, Sun and Star make no mention of it on their front pages and consider others stories - such as Cheryl Cole's love life and a scare story about ibuprofen - more important.

UPDATE 2: It appears that some later editions of the Daily Mail did include the story on the front page, but not as the lead. The article was on page 5.

Sun admits to 'incorrect' claim in Baby P article

A few weeks after their apology to Sylvia Henry, The Sun has clarified another article about the Baby P case:

Haringey Council

The Sun reported on June 8 that John Suddaby, former head of Haringey Council legal department, had tried to gag the Press from reporting Haringey's role in the Baby P case.

This was incorrect. The only court orders Haringey sought were to protect the welfare of children. We are happy to make this clear.

The Mail's 'wildly speculative' claims about a Chinese city 'mirage'

On 26 June, the Mail website ran this headline:


The byline is Daily Mail Reporter - probably because no-one would want to admit to writing this:

Residents in a Chinese city have been stunned after a giant mirage of a 'ghost city' towered across the skyline.

The apparition appeared earlier this month after heavy rainfall and humid conditions along the Xin'an River in Huanshan City in East China.

Tall buildings, mountains and trees appeared to rise up through the ghostly mist that had descended over the river at dusk. There is usually nothing buy sky across the horizon.

'Usually nothing buy [sic] sky'? Really?

The pictures have baffled experts who visited the city to check that there were not actually any of the building already there.

It is believed that the sight may have been a mirage - a form of illusion that is common in in humid weather...

Although they happen occasionally, the mirage in China is believed to be one of the clearest ever recorded.

All of which makes it sound as if this 'ghost city' really did appear from nowhere - there's not a hint of doubt in the mind of Daily Mail Reporter that this 'mirage' did happen. Yet you don't need to be an 'expert' to think the buildings might actually exist.

The Chinese woman speaking in the video - a silly ITN report that the Mail repeats without question - says:

It’s really amazing. It looks like a scene in the movie, in a fairyland

Looking like a 'fairyland' - because the buildings are surrounded by cloud - is rather different to a 'mirage'. Moreover, there are several comments under the Mail article claiming there was a problem with the translation in the original video.

Here's Australian journalist Auki Henry:

The 'Huangshan city mirage' generated some wildly speculative claims amidst a whirlwind of media misinformation and hype. In a nutshell the reality was bad chinese translation combined with hyper-sensationalist reporting. All the buildings in the footage are real buildings, not visions, mirages or illusions, they actually physically stand exactly where they were filmed. The only thing out of the ordinary here is they are surrounded by floodwater and mist.

And Henry produces a graphic, clearly showing the buildings are indeed real.

Which might go some way to explaining why this is such a 'clear' recording of this, ahem, 'mirage'.

(Hat-tip to Tim Ireland)

Express front page: vitamin supplement has just gone on sale

Another day, another health story on the front page of the Express:


Only yesterday, the Express was claiming there was a 'wonder pill' to 'reverse premature ageing'. This was an article by the paper's health correspondent Jo Willey, which echoed claims made on the front page of the paper two years ago about a compound called rapamycin. But, as with Wednesday's 'cake 'cures' dementia' story, it was jumping to conclusions based on some tests conducted on mice. It ended with a key quote:

Dr Dimitri Krainc, from Massachusetts General Hospital, said: “It should be emphasised that we are not recommending rapamycin as an anti-ageing medicine at this point. Safer versions would have to be developed for such purpose."

Today, there's a new 'wonder pill' for the Express to get over-excited about - and this one claims to be as good as eating five portions of fruit and veg a day. It's Jo Willey bringing us the 'good news' again:

A new pill containing all the goodness of the recommended five-a-day portions of fruit and veg could change the eating habits of millions.

The makers claim each capsule is packed with the vitamins and essential ­nutrients of a kilo of fresh produce.

According to Wikipedia, this product has been around since 1993, so although it only went on sale in the UK yesterday, it's not clear why the Express refers to it as a 'new pill'.

And including the words 'the makers claim' in the second sentence of the article gives the game away: this isn't a premature report about some research on mice. This is an actual product and the Express is doing its best to sell it to its readers:

Each capsule of the supplement Juice Plus+ contains 17 different fruits, vegetables and grains that are juiced and then made into a powder using a special drying process which does not damage the micronutrients.

This isn't front page news. It's a 556-word advert which even includes the crucial information that:

The pills cost £24.75 for a month’s supply and users are supposed to take four a day.

The Daily Mail's Claire Bates received the same press release as Willey. Her article contains several of the same points, mentions the same people who have endorsed it, and includes the same quotes from the UK distributor. The Mail helpfully provides a list of ingredients and RDA information and adds:

A month's supply costs £35.50 and a minimum order is four months.

It's not clear why the two papers have different prices, but it hardly matters.

The Mail does, eventually, recognise there are doubts about the product:

The company points to 16 clinical studies that found the pill supported the immune system, boosted heart health and effectively increased antioxidant nutrients in the body.

However, although the research was published in peer-review journals, most of it was funded by the manufacturer. The company say such sponsored projects are normal practice in the industry.

This claim is also made on Wikipedia, where it is stated (with references, removed from the following extract) that:

Of the published peer-reviewed studies on Juice Plus products, the majority were funded and/or authored by the manufacturer, Natural Alternatives International (NAI);or the main distributor, NSA.; two were funded by individual Juice Plus distributors; and one was conducted independently.

The Mail continues:

Scientists at the University of California Berkeley have also shed doubt on the glowing testimonials for the product.

They said it was impossible to deliver' nutrients of five servings of fruits in several capsules weighing 850mg.

They added in their Wellness Guide to Dietary Supplements: 'No capsules can substitute for fruits and vegetables, which contain the best balance of nutrients and phytochemicals.'

'You cannot "concentrate" significant amounts of them in a capsule.'

They warned that the supplement was distributed through a multi-tiered marketing scheme that gave it an exaggerated value and cost.

In the final three sentences, the Express finally mentions these doubts, quoting nutritionist Angela Dowden, who says:

"I would be dubious of anything claiming to give you your five-a-day in a pill...though this might be a tempting shortcut, it’s not one I would rely on."

Yet this comes at the end of the extended advert, after the supplement has already been called a 'wonder pill' and a 'sensation'.

And this is the front page lead news story of, in its own words, the 'World's Greatest Newspaper'.

Cake: it doesn't cure dementia

Yesterday's Daily Express carried the surprising headline:


Yes, really. Cake 'cure' for dementia.

Here's the paper's health correspondent Jo Willey:

Scientists are hailing an everyday cooking spice as a possible cure for Alzheimer’s – after finding clues in the Bible.

They say cinnamon, used in everything from cakes to curries, could be the “holy grail” in slowing or even eradicating dementia in patients.

An extract in cinnamon bark called CEppt was given in ­liquid form to mice and fruit flies bred with Alzheimer’s. After four months, the diseased creatures were said to have shown “remarkably” normal “activity levels and longevity”.

So it's not actually a 'cake cure' and as it has not been tested on humans, it may not be a cure at all.

At the end of the article, there's a tell-tale quote from the Alzheimer's Society:

“Although these results look promising in mice and fruit flies, it’s too soon to know what effect it would have in people.

“We wouldn’t recommend stocking up on cinnamon doughnuts just yet. The amount needed to have any hope would far exceed that in an everyday diet.”

Another statement from the Society reiterated this point:

However people shouldn't rush out to buy this popular spice. This research is in the early stages and looked at mice not humans. We are therefore a long way from using cinnamon in the fight against Alzheimer's.

NHS Behind the Headlines has more:

It is important to note that this was an animal study and its findings may not apply to humans. Also, these experiments used a cinnamon extract rather than cinnamon itself, and it is not clear whether eating cinnamon would have the same effect. It is also unclear how much cinnamon it would be necessary to eat to have an effect, and there are chemicals in cinnamon bark that may have harmful effects if eaten in large quantities.

This is preliminary research and more investigation is needed to determine whether this extract is safe and works in humans. It is much too early to claim that this extract could be the “holy grail” for slowing or eradicating Alzheimer’s disease.

And:

The Daily Express overstated the findings of this study. Stating that a “Cake cure for dementia” has been discovered is premature as this study examined the impact of a specific extract derived from cinnamon, not cake, in animal models of dementia rather than in humans.

Transforming old quotes into a 'new' feature

The centre page spread in Wednesday's Daily Star was a feature on model-turned-'actress' Rosie Huntingdon-Whiteley. It ran under the byline Nadine Linge and was illustrated by three pictures of Rosie in her underwear.

It appears to be a short interview - the text is dotted with comments such as 'jokes Rosie' and 'Rosie laughs' before and after quotes.

But it seems clear Linge hasn't actually interviewed Rosie at all.

Linge writes:

Rosie Huntington-Whiteley admits she’s infatuated with the [Prince Harry], even though she’s been loved-up with actor Jason Statham for over a year.

“I’m waiting for my proposal,” jokes Rosie.

“I keep writing. I think he knows how obsessed I am. Well, he does now!

“He’s so handsome. Come on Harry!”

But these words that will be familiar to anyone who saw the Mail's article on an interview Rosie did with Regis and Kelly in the US:

The 24-year-old Victoria's Secret beauty said she was infatuated with the Royal and gushed: 'I'm waiting for my proposal. I keep writing. 'I think he knows how obsessed I am. Well, he does now. He's so handsome.'

And she said she could picture herself walking down the aisle with the prince, urging: 'Come on Harry!'

Linge writes later:

The Plymouth-born beauty laughs: “When I was filming I couldn’t come back to Britain due to visa issues and I really missed my family big time. Luckily my mum sends me little care packages of chocolate, Walkers crisps and anything British.

“I love eating really, really bad things like roast dinners and chocolate bread and butter pudding. I find it strange some people say English food is bad. To me it’s delicious.”

Some of those words will be familiar to anyone who saw the Mail's article on an interview Rosie did with Maxim magazine:

“I love eating really, really bad things like roast dinners and chocolate bread and butter pudding. I find it strange some people say English food is bad. To me it’s delicious.”

Linge continues:

She’d love to become the new Angelina Jolie. And with Rosie’s equally fab figure and pouting lips, the Tomb Raider star had better watch her back.

“Would I like even a sniff of Angelina Jolie’s career?” says Rosie. “Yes. Do I think I have a future in this business? I hope so. And I’ll work damn hard to ensure I do.

“I’m not standing here and saying I’m an amazing actress or I’ve had a heap of training. But I don’t think I ever even dreamt this would be a possibility.”

Clearly, someone at the Star has a copy of the July 2011 edition of GQ, where Rosie says:

‘Would I like even a sniff of Angelina Jolie’s career? Yes. Do I think I have a future in this business? I certainly hope so. And I’m going to work damn hard to make sure I do,’ she said.

Adding: ‘I’m not standing here and saying I’m an amazing actress or that I’ve had a heap of thespie training. But you’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t.’

None of these sources are credited anywhere in the feature.

This comes soon after Jerry Lawton appears to have pulled quotes by Manchester United club chaplain John Boyers from other sources without credit, including an interview in the United We Stand fanzine.

Currently, there is much debate about interviews that have appeared under Johann Hari's byline in the Independent. Hari has, quite rightly, been criticised for using, without acknowledgement, quotes that were actually published elsewhere and which were not said during his conversations with his interviewees.

Although the Star does not explicitly say this is a new interview, the references to her laughing and joking clearly conveys this impression. Will the reaction be the same? Or will people shrug and say: 'Well, it's only the Daily Star'.

The most popular stories on the Mail's website

Last week, this blog highlighted a MailOnline article about Kim Kardashian crossing a road. On the same day, Georgina Littlejohn was breathlessly explaining how Kim's sister Kourtney had been seen in 'high wedged sandals'. In an article which was essentially 'woman goes out wearing shoes', Littlejohn wrote:

the teeny tiny reality TV star must have been feeling particularly short yesterday judging by her shoes.

That same day, the latest ABCe figures showed that 77,250,993 unique visitors went to the Mail's website in May 2011, making it by far the most visited UK newspaper website (the Guardian was second, with 51.3m monthly visitors)

As this blog has pointed out several times before, MailOnline publisher Martin Clarke told the Press Gazette in 2009:

"It does annoy me that people say its all driven by search and showbiz stories because it’s actually not driven by either…

"Showbiz is less that 25 per cent of traffic. News is far more important to us that showbiz. News is what drives our site."

So, in the wake of the ABCe numbers, what does the Mail's 'Site's most read' section tell us about the popularity of the Mail's news and showbiz stories?

Here is the list of the ten most popular articles on their website so far today:


And the most popular over the last seven days:


And the most popular over the 30 days:


It shows that the Mail's news stories - what 'drives their site' - are less popular than 'woman dyes her hair', 'woman goes to Wimbledon' and 'footballer goes to Glastonbury'.

Compare that to the most read stories on the BBC website at time of writing:

'News' from the Mail website: three-year-old YouTube videos

By contrast, today the Mail website has a 'story' quite prominent on its homepage about foxes on a trampoline:


The story runs to six sentences, plus the video (embedded from YouTube) and four screenshots from it.

But the video the Mail uses was originally posted on YouTube on 19 September 2008.

And this isn't a one off. Just five days ago, the Mail revealed:


The article, by Jennifer Madison, is a description of what happens in the short video and includes eight stills. The video is embedded at the end.

And this one is even older - it was posted on YouTube on 31 December 2007.

(Hat-tips to @JonathanHaynes and @j0annepsi)

'That is not my dad'

A heart-warming story in the Evening Standard last week about Laura Robson's dad taking time off work to watch his daughter's second round match at Wimbledon:


But Robson tweeted:


(Photo from Laura Robson's lockerz.com page)

Mail website apologises for incorrect caption

The Mail website published this apology to Michael Mates on 21 June:

An article published on MailOnline on 2 July 2010 included a photograph of former MP Mr Michael Mates which was wrongly captioned “Downfall: Former Tory Northern Ireland Secretary was forced to resign after he was paid cash for House questions”. We would like to clarity [sic] that Mr Mates was not forced to resign and nor was he paid cash for House questions. We apologise to Mr Mates.