Decision of the Complaints Committee 06056-19 Baker v The
Daily Telegraph
Summary of Complaint
1. David Baker complained to the Independent Press Standards
Organisation that The Daily Telegraph breached Clause 1 (Accuracy) of the
Editors’ Code of Practice in an article headlined “’Public backs Johnson to
shut down Parliament for Brexit’”, published on 13 August 2019.
2. The article reported on a poll which had been
commissioned by the newspaper. It reported that this poll had suggested that
the Prime Minister had “the support of more than half of the public to deliver Brexit
by any means, including suspending Parliament”. It went on to explain that the
poll had found that “…54 per cent of British adults think Parliament may have
to be prorogued to prevent MPs stopping a no deal Brexit”. This statement
appeared on the front page of the publication.
3. The article also appeared online on 12 August 2019 with
the headline “Boris Johnson has public’s support to shut down Parliament to get
Brexit over line, exclusive poll suggests”. It was largely the same as the
print article, with the addition of a segment which reported other findings of
the same poll.
4. The complainant said that the article had distorted the
findings of the poll, in breach of Clause 1. He said that the poll did not find
that “more than half” of the public, or 54% of British adults, agreed that
Parliament should be prorogued to prevent MPs stopping a no-deal Brexit. In
fact, the poll had found that 44% of respondents agreed with this statement,
37% disagreed, and 19% said that they did not know; it was not the case that a
majority of people agreed. The complainant said that in order to claim that the
poll had found that 54% of respondents agreed with the statement, the article
had excluded the respondents who had answered “don’t know”, and had then
calculated the level of support as split only between the remaining respondents
who had expressed a view. He said that failing to make this fact clear meant
that the article was a misleading report of the poll.
5. The publication did not accept that the article had
distorted the poll or contained any significant inaccuracies. It said that it
had relied on the polling company’s own press release which was a summary of
the poll’s findings, in which it said that a “majority of public would support
proroguing Parliament to deliver Brexit” and that “a majority (54%) of the
public agree that Boris Johnson needs to deliver Brexit by any means, even if
that meant suspending Parliament“. It said that it was entitled to rely on this
press release, and that it was common practice for articles reporting on polls
to exclude “don’t knows” from results. It provided several examples of where
other publications had reported polls in this way and noted that the polling
company had released a statement commenting on the practice of excluding “don’t
knows” from results, which said that “every political pollster recalculates
data to exclude the undecided”.
6. Furthermore, the publication said that excluding the
“don’t know” responses did not give a misleading impression of the overall
results of the poll. It was not in dispute that the largest number of people
had supported the statement that Parliament may need to be prorogued to prevent
MPs stopping a no-deal Brexit; it said that in the broad context of the current
political debate over Brexit, and the poll’s significance in this context, the
distinction between reporting that a “majority” of respondents, and the
“largest proportion” was trite and meaningless.
7. Nevertheless, the publication said that in response to
concerns, it had amended the online article to state that “[Prime Minister] has
the support of most people who have an opinion to deliver Brexit by any means,
including suspending Parliament, according to a poll” and that the survey found
that “54% of British adults who expressed a view think Parliament should be
prorogued to prevent MPs stopping a no-deal Brexit”. It also published the
following wording as a footnote to the online article, and in print in its
corrections and clarifications column on page two, on 15 August, two days after
the original article was published:
Poll results
A 13 August article reported that 54 per cent of the public
think Parliament may have to be prorogued to deliver Brexit by Oct 31. This was
the proportion of respondents in a ComRes poll who agreed that the Prime
Minister “need to deliver Brexit by any means, including suspending Parliament
if necessary.” This figure however excluded those who expressed no view. Of all
respondents 44 per cent agreed, 37 per cent disagreed and 19 per cent didn’t
know.
8. The newspaper said that should the terms of Clause 1(ii)
be engaged, the published correction adequately clarified any ambiguity which
may have arisen from the original article and was sufficiently prompt and
prominent, so as to satisfy the requirements of this Clause. It said that the
Corrections and Clarifications column on page two was well known to readers as
the place to look should a correction or clarification be required, and was
prominently placed within the newspaper; publishing wording elsewhere would be
unexpected and thus less prominent for readers. It said that there was no
significant public interest in requiring a front-page correction in this case;
there was no argument that the article had affected the government’s opinion of
possible prorogation, and there were no significant consequences from any
possible misapprehension of meaning. Finally, it said that the only part of the
front page article which may qualify for greater clarity was the first sentence
and did not accept that this created any significantly misleading impression of
the poll.
9. Finally, the complainant said that the action taken by
the publication was not sufficient and any correction or remedial action should
appear on the publication’s front page.
Relevant Code Provisions
10. Clause 1 (Accuracy)
i) The Press must
take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted information or
images, including headlines not supported by the text.
ii) A significant
inaccuracy, misleading statement or distortion must be corrected, promptly and
with due prominence, and — where appropriate — an apology published. In cases
involving IPSO, due prominence should be as required by the regulator.
iii) A fair
opportunity to reply to significant inaccuracies should be given, when
reasonably called for.
iv) The Press, while
free to editorialise and campaign, must distinguish clearly between comment,
conjecture and fact.
Findings of the Committee
11. The article reported that the Prime Minister had “the
support of more than half of the British public” or “54% of British adults” to
deliver Brexit by any means, including by proroguing parliament. These figures
only reflected the respondents who had answered yes or no to the statement, and
excluded the significant proportion who answered “don’t know”; the article did
not explain this in any way. Although the publication had relied upon the
summary of the poll results as presented in the press release, it was still
incumbent upon it to take care to present the poll results accurately. Regardless
of how they may have been presented in the summary, the full poll results were
readily available. Failing to make clear that the “don’t know” responses had
been excluded constituted a failure to take care over the accuracy of the
article. There was a breach of Clause 1(i). Reporting the results of the poll
without making clear that a significant proportion of respondents had not
expressed a view was significantly misleading, particularly where this
interpretation formed the basis for the claim in the article that more than
half of the public were in agreement. As such, a correction was required under
the terms of Clause 1(ii).
12. The Committee then considered whether the corrections
which had been printed satisfied the requirements of Clause 1(ii). The
Committee expressed some concern about the clarity of the correction, but
concluded that it had adequately identified the inaccuracy and the correct
position, such that it met the requirements of Clause 1 (ii). The corrections
had been published two days after the article was published, prior to the
publication becoming aware that IPSO had received any complaints about the
article. This was sufficiently prompt. The Committee also considered that the
corrections were published in sufficiently prominent positions: online, the
correction was published as a footnote to the article, and in print, the
correction appeared on the newspaper’s page two Corrections and Clarifications
column. Although the inaccuracy appeared on the front page, the Committee was mindful
that a newspaper’s established Corrections and Clarifications column is a
familiar and clearly marked area where readers can find corrections, and any
wording contained within this column is clearly signalled as a correction or
clarification. Furthermore, in deciding whether a correction is sufficiently
prominent to satisfy Clause 1(ii), the Committee will consider whether the
position proposed is proportionate to the breach; in this case, the inaccuracy
was confined to the reporting of one finding of the poll, and did not change
the article’s thrust, namely that there was significant support among the
public for the measure. For these reasons, the Committee considered that the
publication of the correction made the correct position clear, and was sufficiently
prompt and prominent to remedy the breach of Clause 1(i) and there was no
breach of Clause 1(ii).
Conclusions
13. The complaint was upheld under Clause 1(i).
Remedial Action Required
14. Having upheld the complaint, the Committee considered
what remedial action should be required
15. The publication had published a correction sufficiently
promptly and with due prominence as to meet the requirements of Clause 1(ii).
There was no further breach of Clause 1(ii), and no further remedial action
required.
Date complaint received: 13/08/2019
Date decision issued: 08/01/2020
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