Caring Carole

First it was incredulity. Now it's anger. Raw anger. The people of Cumbria are raging - yet their anger isn't directed at Derrick Bird.

At least not yet. For now it's directed at a world that has suddenly and without warning invaded their lives, a world that is shining an unwelcome light on them at a time when they are scared and vulnerable and confused.

It's as if Derrick Bird is their shame, their failure and they want to deal with it privately in their own time.

These proud working class communities don't want to grieve, to heal themselves with the world looking on...

And where once tourists would come to see the scenery, now they'll come to gawp at Derrick Bird's killing fields.

That's Carole Malone, reporting for the News of the World.

From Cumbria.

Not time for Littlejohn

Richard Littlejohn began his column on Tuesday with this eye-catching claim:

To be honest, I've always considered all Liberal MPs to be homosexuals unless furnished with concrete proof to the contrary.

A tiresome attempt to be deliberately controversial? The latest example of his stupidity? Or, more likely, a bit of both.

Two comments on the Guardian site reacted appropriately. Here's scaryduck:

To be honest, I've always considered all Daily Mail columnists to be morons unless furnished with concrete proof to the contrary.

And Spoonface:

To be honest, I've always considered Richard Littlejohn to be a bigoted little halfwit, and he constantly furnishes me with proof that I'm right.

Today, another column, this one carrying the headline This was a tragedy, not time for Plodspeak.

It's not time for Littlejohn's petty attempts at point-scoring against the police either.

He couldn't really avoid writing about the tragic events in Cumbria, but obviously needed a hook. So while most of his comments are rather bland platitudes about the shootings, he added his bit of controversy by launching an attack on the police, which is something he does in his columns all the time anyway.

And he really does have the dirt on the Cumbria force:

I was surprised by the tone of the press conference given by Cumbria's Deputy Chief Constable, Stuart Hyde, at tea-time on Wednesday, in which he kept referring to the man who had just killed 12 people and wounded another 25 as 'Mister' Bird.

Yes. Whether we call the killer 'Mr' Bird, or not - that's the really big issue that comes from Wednesday's shootings, isn't it?

He goes on to criticise the police for their statement which had a few sentences at the end to say Cumbria was going to try to carry on as normal:

"Cumbria prides itself on being a safe place to work, play and visit. Cumbria is a tightly knit community covering some of the most beautiful countryside in the land, its strength is as much its people as its geography.

"It remains one of the safest areas of the UK and is very much open for business and tourism despite the tragic circumstances of the last few hours."

Why is this a problem? Similar sentiments were expressed by the police after the London bombings in 2005.

But that's not good enough for Littlejohn:

He sounded like a junior tourism official...

Did Hyde not realise how tactless and crass it sounded...?

I shuddered to think of the reaction of a bereaved relative who had just been told that a loved one had been shot dead and had turned on the TV to hear a police spokesman banging on about the effects on tourism.

...it struck a jarring, insensitive note at a time of terrible tragedy.

All of which shows what a nasty little hypocrite Littlejohn is. As these two comments point out, it was Littlejohn who, only a few weeks after the murder of five women in Ipswich, dismissed the victims as:

disgusting, drug-addled street whores

And added:

in the scheme of things the deaths of these five women is no great loss.

But today, Littlejohn suddenly pretends to care about people being 'tactless and crass' and striking 'jarring, insensitive' notes that might upset 'bereaved relatives'.

It's doubtful anyone will be convinced.

(Angry Mob has an excellent, thoughtful post on today's Littlejohn column, explaining how he dehumanises his targets to make it easier to attack them. His take on Tuesday's column is here)

Liz Jones thinks middle-aged white women are the most criticised people on the planet

It may be an understatement to say Sex and the City 2 has not received a particularly good reception from the critics.

Currently, it has a score of 17% on Rotten Tomatoes, with 137 bad reviews against 29 positive, the latter including one from the Mail's film reviewer, our old friend Chris Tookey.

But Mail columnist Liz Jones also spoke out. Not about the film per se ('it's not a masterpiece') but against all the reviewers who had slated it.

These included Hadley Freeman, who wrote a long article in the Guardian about the Sex and the City phenomenon, concluding:

The death of Sex and the City is not just a shame for fans, but for all women with higher expectations of movies about women than a compendium of cliches from the Daily Mail.

When the Mail re-published Freeman's article, it ended:

The death of Sex And The City is not just a shame for fans, but for all women with higher expectations of movies about women.

Wonder why they edited that sentence?

But to Jones, reviewers like Freeman disliked the film not because it was 'insulting', 'flimsy', 'virtually plotless' and a 'bloated juggernaut of pointlessness'.

Oh no:

You see, the only person in the world you are allowed to criticise these days is the middle-aged, affluent white woman.

Yes, really.

It's not difficult to see why Jones feels some affinity for middle-aged, white, materialistic women - she spends £9 on a tube of toothpaste, after all - and she's had her fair of criticism.

However, she neglects to mention the fact that Sex and the City 2 was written and directed by a man, which would slightly undercut her argument.

But do you know who she thinks has it easier than middle-aged, affluent white women?

The Muslims:

Serve up any old rubbish if you are Muslim and you’ll be lauded to the skies.

Umm...what? The use of 'Muslims' is telling. It's that typical Mail line - look what they can get away with that us white folk can't.

But when has she or the Mail ever lauded anything about Muslims, let alone their 'rubbish'? It would be great if she could provide just one example of this from her or her paper.

Categorically not proving her point, she adds, sniffily:

Take the item on Radio 4 on Saturday, when Fi Glover announced we’d be learning about a film on the success of Pop Idol...in Afghanistan.

A film, it's clear, Jones hasn't seen, but it's about Muslims and was 'lauded' on Radio 4 so it must be 'rubbish'.

She's referring to Afghan Star, which currently has a rating of 100% on Rotten Tomatoes, with all of its 54 reviews being positive.

Oh, and the director of Afghan Star is a white woman who was born, and lives, in Britain, which she doesn't mention either.

It's a documentary about an interesting and original subject.

Sex and the City 2 is a two-and-a-half hour sequel to a two-and-a-half hour film, following 94 episodes on television.

But it's definitely not being criticised for flogging a dead horse. Oh no.

Then again, here's a quote from Jones' review of the first Sex and the City film:

I wanted to hate this film.

She didn't, but admitted:

I laughed very little during the screening (the writing is not as sharp as it was for TV, and the film, at nearly three hours long, feels far too baggy, a little like Samantha's 50-year-old paunch).

Hmm - well that comment isn't a pot-shot at a middle-aged women at all, is it?

So why is she allowed to criticise Sex and the City - and make specifically personal comments about middle-aged women - but no-one else is?

The hypocrite.

And criticising middle-aged women? The Mail would never do such a thing, would it? Surely it wasn't the Mail that was today calling the 43-year-old Sinead O'Connor 'frumpy', 'dowdy' and 'grumpy' for no other reason than she looks a bit older than she did 21 years ago?

But really, to try and pretend criticism of one (apparently quite bad) film is the result of some in-built bigotry is slightly paranoid and just plain silly.

And presumably this is all self-serving. In her mind, she isn't criticised because she whines about being poor after wasting money on such nonsense as a homeopathic vet for her chickens.

Nor is she criticised because she writes columns of jaw-dropping inanity for the Mail - her comparison of Emma Watson to the victim of a so-called 'honour-killing' being a particularly telling example.

No, she is criticised solely because she's a white, middle-aged woman.

Whereas if she was Muslim she'd never suffer such brickbats...

Although if she was Muslim, she probably wouldn't have such a high-profile position at the Mail.

Recommended reading

Yesterday morning, the Mail website's top story was The £18,000 council job you can't apply for if you are white.

It was a lot of sound and fury about Bristol City Council advertising two training posts (not jobs) for BME graduates.

By early afternoon, the BNP had the story on their website, claiming:

The anti-white and anti-British establishment has abandoned any pretence at fairness and at last broken its cover with the advertising of local government jobs for which white people are forbidden from applying.

Both Five Chinese Crackers and Angry Mob have looked at the story and both articles are well worth reading.

As 5CC says:

The [Mail] could approach issues from a far more sensible perspective, but chooses to exaggerate and lie instead. When those lies and exaggerations extend to how much of a wonderful and unfair advantage ethnic minorities and other out-groups get, it's particularly nasty, and so are the potential consequences.

That's when the paper stops being just disappointing and starts being potentially dangerous.

Another Migrationwatch press release gets the churnalism treatment

The appearance of a new Migrationwatch press release is the cause of celebration at certain newspapers, because it means they can produce a story that bashes immigrants without doing any actual journalism.

None of the churnalists writing about Migrationwatch's new figures - about the numbers of visas-leading-to-settlement granted under the new 'points based system' (PBS) - seem to have bothered to make even a cursory check that they're reliable.

Migrationwatch claims Labour's 'Tough' Points Based System Actually Increased Immigration.

The first set of figures they compare shows that the number of 'entry clearances' for skilled and highly skilled workers actually fell by over 23,000 over the period:


The next set of figures is for visa extensions, and this is where it starts to look a little shaky:


Since the PBS was only introduced in June 2008, there's no way there could be any tier 1 or 2 'visa extensions' in 2007. Unlike with the previous set of numbers, Migrationwatch do not find the 2007 'equivalents'.

This leaves a rather large hole in both their figures and their subsequent claims.

How can they realistically, and honestly, suggest the 2009 figures say anything about immigration trends when they fail to provide comparable numbers from previous years?

After all, visa extensions did exist in 2007 and were, in total, higher overall then than in 2009. Going to back to the official figures which Migrationwatch used shows this very clear decline:

• 2007 - 274,020
• 2008 - 267,865
• 2009 - 251,245

Migrationwatch also provide numbers for work permits (which dropped - 44,685 in 2007; 7,290 in 2009) and for dependents (which increased by 5,565).

Overall, going by page 33 of the official stats, the very page Migrationwatch uses, the grand total of entry clearance visas including dependents is down (2,072,430 in 2007 and 1,995,840 in 2009).

Yet in the certain categories they have selected, Migrationwatch have claimed there's been an increase of 20%:


But strip out the 86,000 from the 'visa extensions' - or find and add in the equivalent figures for work-permit holders who gained extensions in 2007 - and that increase looks rather less certain.

In any case, immigration suggests people coming in - certainly in the minds of the hacks who then wrote about these figures. Yet 'visa extensions' clearly suggests that these are people already here.

But that didn't stop the Mail saying:


If that sounds like Migrationwatch's headline, that's not a surprise - Slack's article contains all their press release quotes.

Slack says:

Labour's supposedly tough points-based immigration system actually led to huge increases in foreign workers...cleared to live in Britain.

Except the number of new workers 'cleared to live in Britain' was down.

The Telegraph mindlessly followed too:


But the increase in Migrationwatch's figures includes visa extensions. These are not 'extra migrants...allowed into Britain' and the first figures show the number of foreign workers let in is down.

The Express went with:


As you can see from the opening paragraph, Martyn Brown makes a similar mistake, and goes further in claiming Migrationwatch's figures are about all non-EU migrants.

The BNP, as usual, picked up on Migrationwatch's figures and, having got out a calculator and added up all the big numbers, declared 1.2million immigrants had come in under the PBS in the last three years, despite it being in force for only 18 months.

The problem is the tabloids are obsessed with trying to prove there are too many immigrants coming to the UK. Migrationwatch are too, and so any press release sent to the tabloid churnalists which has an eye-catching headline, a few respectable-looking figures and an anti-immigrant message is grist to the mill.

There's no thought given to questioning the stats, no double checking, no quotes from anyone who may challenge Migrationwatch - because they have no interest in proving them wrong.

(More analysis of Migrationwatch's figures available at Left Foot Forward)

Lies from behind bars

On 18 April, the News of the World published the type of article that has become a staple of the red-tops - a piece of gossip about an infamous prisoner which is based solely on the word of an anonymous source.

Who could forget the Sun's homophobic, fictional article about Boy George eyeing up Jack Tweed in the prison showers?

And the latest example is on the front of today's Sun, which was nothing more than what a 'prison insider' had claimed about Stephen Griffiths.

The News of the World's Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe fuming after parole bid knocked back explained:

Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe will NOT walk free after a judge ruled out evidence from his Broadmoor psychiatrist, we can reveal.

The serial killer is fuming after his lawyers broke the news at a crunch meeting this week.

Sutcliffe, 63, had pinned his hopes of winning his High Court bid for parole after 30 years behind bars on a report by Dr Kevin Murray saying he posed a "low" risk of re-offending.

A source told us: "Peter was shown a list of people for whom life means life, including Ian Brady, to spell out that he's in the same boat. He's moaning that he's been stitched up."

Sadly a few days ago, it rather fell apart, when the paper had to publish this:

In an April 18 article, we wrongly reported that Peter Sutcliffe learned at a legal meeting that a bid for parole had been denied after a judge ruled out a report from his Broadmoor psychiatrist.

We now accept that our report, published in good faith, was inaccurate.

Peter Sutcliffe has not applied for parole, nor did any such meeting or judicial ruling of any sort take place. We are happy to set the record straight and regret the inaccuracies.

Three things: first, no mention in the clarification of Sutcliffe 'moaning' and 'fuming'.

Second, the typical expression of regret, but the complete inability to apologise. They 'regret' telling lies, but aren't sorry for misleading their readers.

Third, that phrase 'published in good faith' is also typical because, once again, it shows a newspaper can't just say 'yes, we got it wrong, we're sorry'.

They (very probably) paid for the tip and published it without (apparently) doing much fact-checking.

But by saying they published the story in 'good faith', they're saying: it's not really our fault.

'The offence was created by the actions of the newspaper'

The father of footballer John Terry has been given a suspended six-month sentence (plus community service and a fine) for selling cocaine.

As that offence can carry a jail-term of up to 14 years, the judge in the case, Christopher Mitchell, explained the reason for the sentence:

"It is a very, very clear case of entrapment solely to create a newspaper story...

"The facts in this case are highly unusual. In fact the offence was actually created by the actions of the newspaper sending a journalist to set you up. It is clearly an entrapment case and the only reason they did this was to create a story because of your connections to a well known footballer."

And the newspaper in question? Who else but the News of the World.

Roy Greenslade considers what the PCC should do now, given the judge's clear verdict on the tabloid's methods.

Mail on Sunday gives away England flags, despite 'ban'

Given that the Mail keeps telling us that England flags are being banned, the Mail on Sunday has come up with a strange giveaway today:

Or is simply that this ban on England flags (and shirts) is as non-existent as the ban on talking about immigration?

A tawdry frenzy

The arrest and charging of Stephen Griffiths led to a predictably hysterical outburst from the media. For example:


And it wasn't just the tabloids.

On both the BBC News Channel and Sky News this morning, we had at least 15 minutes of 'reporting' from outside a Bradford court, which involved their on-the-scene reporters saying nothing new over live pictures of the back of police van. When the van moved slightly, the camera crews ran to find a better position, before moving back to where they started when the van moved again.

And all this for a completely unrevealing two second (at most) glimpse of a person in a hoodie who could have been absolutely anyone.

It was dismal stuff - a prime example of what Charlie Brooker called 'boring live nothing'.

Once in court, Griffiths was asked to confirm his name:

Mr Griffiths told the court he was "the crossbow cannibal".

'Crossbow cannibal'? Now where have we heard that before?

Oh:


The overwhelming feeling from all this coverage is almost that we don't need to have a trial. Some sections of the media have already decided Griffiths is guilty.

There seems to be no thought of Barry George, or Robert Murat, or laws on contempt.

Much of it is pure speculation. The articles are peppered with such tell-tale phrases as 'it is understood that...' and 'a source revealed that...' and 'it is not known if...'

We are told - apparently - how he once swallowed a live rat, his mum liked to dress provacatively, he sent 'heavy items' down the communal rubbish chute in the early hours, his family were 'odd', he was a 'weirdo'.

And what about that 'cannibal' claim? The Sun admit:

Police are probing the possibility the killer may have eaten some of her flesh.

But they are still trying to find corroborating evidence.

The Express goes further:

Allegations of cannibalism were last night refuted by senior investigators who said there was "absolutely no evidence" of such an act in any of the cases.

So why did the Sun splash 'cannibal' all over the front page? Do we really need sensationalism in such a story?

Every paper was trying to find their own angle. The Star's was particularly notable:


'I survived the Ripper'. The obvious impression the Star's front page was trying to give was that Griffiths is the 'Ripper', he's guilty and they have spoken to someone who had a narrow escape from him.

But as ever with Star headlines, the story says no such thing:

A former vice girl last night told how a weirdo “with demon eyes” tried to pick her up just days before her prostitute pal was brutally murdered.

Anna Kennedy said she was approached at a petrol station in Bradford’s red light district.

The man seemed fascinated by her conversation with the cashier about the disappearance of two hookers within the past year.

She told the Daily Star the man “made my hairs stand on end” – and was even more terrified when she heard this week about the murder of her hooker friend Suzanne Blamires.

In fact, the Star makes no attempt to claim the 'weirdo with demon eyes' was Griffiths. Or even someone you needed to 'run for your life' from:

“I didn’t like the look of him,” she said.

“There was something about his eyes, demon eyes. Something about him made the hairs stand up on the back of my arms.”

Anna, 36, said she used to see the man “nearly every day’’ for 10 years while she was walking the streets but never felt threatened by him.

Hmm. So man goes up to till in petrol station and woman thinks he's creepy for joining the cashier's conversation. Despite never thinking him creepy for ten years before that.

The tabloids wallow in this stuff and there will be plenty more frenzied coverage over the weekend. It's all rather tawdry, but it is no real surprise - after all, it happens all too regularly.

Failing to tell both sides of the story

The tabloid coverage of the 'ban' on England football shirts became even more ridiculous when the Mail published Driver orders toddler off bus for wearing 'offensive' England football shirt. It never even sounded likely.

It was a mainly a cut-and-paste job from this local newspaper article.

Based solely on the say-so of the mother, it was claimed the driver, who had a Polish or Eastern European or dodgy-foreign-sounding accent, was offended by the two-year-old wearing one of those 'banned' England football shirts. It's political correctness gone mad, etc.

The following day, the Star and the Mirror repeated this tale (along with countless other websites and forums), based solely on the word of the Mail.

But by then the local paper, The Sentinel had returned to the story. They reported that First Bus had received thirty complaints - mainly, it seems, from people who had read about the incident.

One witness who had claimed to have been there said it happened on Monday. But that was the day the Sentinel published the story. The mother said the incident occurred the previous Thursday...

Paul de Santis, from First, told the paper:

"As time has gone we have reached the conclusion that the incident did not happen.

"We have not been able to find any credible witnesses. And we have not been able to confirm the identity of the driver at the centre of the allegation.

"We belive it to be highly unlikely that it happened. If this is the case that is extremely concerning to us. It's not only damaged our reputation, but could have put our staff in danger through potential reprisals."

And First issued an offical statement:

We have carried out a full investigation and can't find any evidence to substantiate this claim. No driver fitting the description given was working on any routes in this area at that time. Our buses were busy around the time yet no one else has been in touch with us about this alleged incident.

We expect the highest level of professionalism from our drivers and such an act would not be tolerated. However, in this instance it now appears that no such incident took place.

Here's the thing: this statement has been in the public domain for two days.

And yet neither the Mail, Star or Mirror have deemed it necessary to inform their readers' about it.

So either they don't want to correct their earlier story, and look like they may have got something wrong, or they are happy to let the myth of banned England shirts rumble on because it suits their PC-gone-mad, Britain-under-attack-from-foreigners agenda.

Or more likely, both.

(More over at Enemies of Reason)

Predictable Peter

Angry Mob reports that Peter Hitchens recently boasted that he was able to see the future.

Yes, in 2007, he made a prediction about the make-up of the Government after the election and now claims he got it right.

He predicted:

• A Labour Government, or
  
• A Tory Government, or
  
• A Lib-Lab pact, or
  
• A Lib-Con pact

Brilliant! Next he'll be telling us that this year's Ashes will be won by England. Or Australia. Or it'll be a drawn series and England will keep the urn.

He added at the time that whoever was in power was going to be full of dodgy Lefties but, as Angry Mob points out:

Considering that Peter is about as far to the right as you can get, it also isn’t much of a bold prediction that whoever got into power would be – according to Peter - ‘in thrall to Left-wing ideas’...[he] considers pretty much everything apart from his own column to be evil left-wing drivel.

Star pays damages; Sun withdraws 'gender bender'

Another month, another payout by one of Richard Desmond's wretched 'newspapers'.

This time, it's the Daily Star that has had to cough up, for invading the privacy of Little Britain star Matt Lucas following the death of Kevin McGee.

MediaGuardian reports:

Lucas informed the media that he did not want to discuss the matter and asked for his privacy to be respected.

However, the Daily Star published a story alleging that Lucas had been put on suicide watch and that he had met a new boyfriend and chosen to move on.

"Such claims are wholly without foundation, and publishing these false claims at this time considerably aggravated the hurt and distress caused by the article," [Lucas' solicitor John] Kelly told the high court.

He added that the newspaper had also published an article speculating that the reason for the couple's divorce was McGee's use of cocaine.

The Express Newspapers:

offered its sincere apologies for invading his privacy and for the distress caused.

That sincerity would be more believable if they'd thought about that before rushing to print.

Meanwhile, the PCC has published details of a resolved complaint, where a woman complained about The Sun calling her a 'gender bender'.

Another sensitive bit of Sun reporting, resolved when:

the newspaper wrote to the complainant accepting her concern about the language used and removed the article from its website.

Alas, as the article was published in 2008, it took the Sun two years to understand the 'concern' about that term.

'Cruel speculation'

'My daughter's no lesbian,' screamed a headline on page 47 of yesterday's Mail on Sunday.

It was accompanying an interview by Jo MacFarlane with Dorien Stewart-Cole, mother of Kimberley. MacFarlane talked of:

unfounded rumours

and

cruel speculation

that Kimberley was in a relationship with another woman. Calling this 'cruel' says much about the attitude to homosexuality at the Mail newspapers.

But what MacFarlane omitted was where this 'unfounded' and 'cruel' gossip came from.

Answer:


Yes - the front page of the Daily Mail, a few days before.

Must have just slipped her mind.

It couldn't possibly be that the Mail papers were trying to pretend it was nothing to do with them...

(Background here and here)

(Thanks to Brian Cathcart)

About that ban on England shirts...

As anyone with a Facebook account already knows, a depressingly large number of people believe the 'PC brigade' is planning to ensure no one steps inside a pub while wearing an England shirt for the entire duration of the World Cup, if not for all time.

None of them seem to have been much thought as to whether this was either true, likely, or even possible.

It seems to have started in the Sun, with the headline: Bid to ban England tops in World Cup pubs.

Unfortunately, once you read the first line of that article, with the all important 'could be banned' by 'killjoy cops' you knew it wasn't actually happening.

The more you read, the more it unravelled:

The advice comes in a letter from the Metropolitan Police to pubs in Croydon, South London.

Among World Cup guidance, it suggests 'dress code restrictions - eg no football shirts'.

So it's 'advice', rather than some all-encompassing, this-must-be-obeyed diktat. A Met Police spokesman said (when it was issued several weeks ago):

“There’s no obligation to follow the advice. It’s a series of suggestions sent to pubs in Croydon.”

And it's a letter from one police force, to pubs in one part of the country (where there were riots when England lost to France in the Euro 2004 championship - the advice also included plastic containers and extra security on the door).

And the advice it asks landlords to consider is actually 'no football shirts', not 'no England shirts'.

But apart from all that...

Sunny Hundal and Anton at Enemies of Reason (here and here) have already posted on this story, and debunked it, but as if to make it absolutely clear, the Met Police finally denied the story yesterday:

A spokesman said: "This letter contains a series of suggestions to make pubs safer for everyone.

"However, licensees are not obliged to follow our advice and there is no policy to stop the wearing of England shirts."

And an Inspector from West Midlands Police also denied there was any ban on flags:

"It is nonsense. Police officers are football fans too and patriotism should be an important part of enjoying the tournament in a fun and friendly atmosphere as long as people are sensible."

What is frightening is not just that people still manage to get whipped up by believing an obviously bogus story in the Sun, but that it unleashes a streak of anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim sentiment despite it being both untrue and nothing to do with either group.

Independent on Sunday pays libel damages for defamatory headline

The writer Zoe Margolis has won 'substantial' libel damages from the Independent on Sunday after they falsely called her a 'hooker' in a 7 March headline.

As if to add insult to injury, the headline accompanied an article written by Margolis in which she criticised 'stigma and stereotypes' and 'old-fashioned, sexist views on female sexuality'. Her spokesman explained her point was:

'that if you are a woman, writing about sex openly, it is very likely you will be labelled with negative terminology'.

The IoS changed the headline the day it appeared, but did not publish an apology until five days later:

We accept that Ms Margolis is not and never has been “a hooker” or otherwise involved in the sex industry.

The wording of the headline was a mistake and seriously defamatory of Ms Margolis.

A press release on Margolis' blog, posted on Thursday, said:

The resulting effect of this libel was immeasurable, and Ms. Margolis was forced to issue legal proceedings against Independent News & Media Ltd.

These proceedings have now come to a conclusion and substantial damages have been offered to Ms. Margolis for the distress and impact to her reputation, both personal and professional, that this libel caused.

In court, the Independent's lawyer said:

'We sincerely apologise for the distress and embarrassment this headline caused. It was untrue and should never have been published.'