A letter to the PCC

So you may have guessed that I wasn't too thrilled with the PCC's outright rejection of my complaint about Richard Littlejohn. Based on comments on the blog and on Twitter (not to mention the traffic figures for Primly Stable going through the roof - thanks for your support, everyone!), I wasn't the only person out there who was displeased. So this morning I replied to the PCC case officer. I'm not expecting to hear anything back, but what the hey...



Many thanks for your response.

While I accept that PCC rules mean I have no right to take this further, I have to say I am extremely disappointed with the decision. Essentially the PCC has said it is acceptable for newspapers to publish lies, provided they support the views of the columnist. And that is what Richard Littlejohn did in the column in question – he lied to his readers. To try and claim that he was making an ”amplified statement for rhetorical effect” to make a point about the state not helping people “who do the right thing” is absurd. He lied about the benefits on offer to immigrants and asylum seekers in a story about the plight of a homeless soldier, even though the two cases are entirely separate. This was not a “rhetorical device” in any recognised definition of the term. It was a naked attempt to blame foreigners for the lack of available council housing.

I’m also deeply suspicious of your claim that “readers would be aware that the columnist was not accurately reflecting the government’s policy on the housing of immigrants”. The Mail’s website also contains a news story about Lance Corporal Lance Corporal Craig Baker, the soldier at the centre of this issue. Comments from readers underneath the story include the following:

“He should just have told that council he was an illegal immigrant from Afghanistan....And he would have been housed immediately!!”

“expect no better from Bracknell Forest Council, because they are fast-tracking immigrants to the head of the housing queue ... just the same as all councils throughout Britain are daily doing”

“He should go back to Aghanistan, throw away his British passport and come back as a 'refugee'. Apartment in Mayfair awaits him.”

“Single mothers come on top of the list dont they plus foreigners”

“criag ,you should have lobbed your passport on the way back from afghanistan you would have gone way up the list”

“Why is it that the UK gives housing, benefits and anything else that migrants want.”

“Throw your passport away,make out you can't talk understand English. Answer?, the life of riley!!!!!!!!!!!1”

All of these comments have received hundreds of “positive” ratings from fellow Daily Mail readers, which rather suggests that they ARE NOT aware of the finer points of the government’s policy on the housing of immigrants. What evidence does the PCC have to support its view?

Had Littlejohn compared the soldier’s situation with, for example, a convicted criminal who had been released from prison and promptly housed in local authority accommodation than he may have had some grounds to claim that he was making a point about people who “do the right thing” losing out. But he didn’t. He chose to make something up entirely. To lie. And with this ruling the PCC has said such conduct is perfectly acceptable.

I had very little faith in the PCC’s ability to hold the media to account before this episode. Now I have none. The organisation proudly boasts of its rapid response to the shocking inaccuracy that led to one organisation being called “the first specialist thumb-sucking clinic in London” when in fact it was the second. But it is happy to give the seal of approval to a newspaper that publishes lies in order to whip up racial tensions.

I shall be sending copies of all our correspondence to my MP, along with a request for him to raise the issue of media self-regulation with the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport.

The Curious Case of the Metric Headlines in the Daily Mail

The metric system. Nice easy way of measuring things in units divisible by 10 or, in the words of Grandpa Simpson, "the tool of the devil"?

For many years now Britain's tabloids have been firmly in the latter camp. Despite the fact that every child born in Britain since at least 1979 has been schooled in the use of metres, kilograms and litres, the likes of the Mail, Express and, at the "higher" end of the market, the Telegraph are united in their hatred of all things metric.

It's an "un-British" imposition being forced on us by politically correct lefties and the European Union, quite probably in the name of Elf 'N' Safety. To quote Grandpa Simpson a second time, their attitude has been very much along the lines of: "My car gets 40 rods to the hogshead, and that's they way I likes it!"

Just this morning in the Daily Mail, columnist Peter Hitchens bemoaned the way the evil decimal-based system was being used in reports about the Snowpocalypse:

"The intensifying campaign to force the foreign, unwieldy metric system on the British people continues apace. Broadcasters and newspapers have virtually abolished the yard (still lawfully used on thousands of road signs) and the foot. But their most determined campaign is against the inch. Why do the weather people insist on telling us that 10cm of snow have fallen? Partly, they do it because they are fanatics. Partly because it sounds much worse than 4in. A country halted by 4in of snow sounds – and is – rather pathetic."

You know that when the Mail - and in particular Peter Hitchens - says "broadcasters" he's really complaining about the BBC. In the past he's even FoI'd the Corporation to try and uncover official rules that force Beeb hacks to use metric measurements over imperial ones. But perhaps he should start his crusade a little closer to home. Because also in today's Daily Mail is this headline:

What's that decidedly foreign-looking measure of temperature in the headline? Could it be - gasp! - a metric unit? In the past week there have been many, many more sightings of the metric menace in Mail headlines:

Extra points for the mix-and-match approach in the last one there.

So why is the Mail using the "foreign, unwieldy metric system" in its headlines? Could it be that "minus 7c" sounds, colder, scarier and generally more Snowpocalyptic than a rather pathetic "19f"?

UPDATE!
Just in case you can't be arsed to read the comments underneath, I should point out that Hitch's column appeared in the Mail on Sunday yesterday (5 December), not this morning's main paper. However, it was published on the Mail website this morning.

PCC says it's OK to lie

So after a couple of months of pondering, the PCC have got around to replying to my complaint. You remember the one, where I pointed out that Richard Littlejohn was talking out of his arse when he claimed that "any Afghan climbing off the back of a lorry in Dover goes automatically to the top of the housing list"?

He said this despite the fact that it is simply not true - asylum seekers do not even join the housing queue and illegal immigrants (for fairly obvious reasons) aren't entitled to council houses and benefits at all. So Richard Littlejohn, who likes to portray himself as a man who speaks uncomfortable truths, made something up. He gave false information to his readers. He lied. And he did all this in an article that essentially blamed Afghan asylum seekers for the fact that an ex-soldier who served in Afghanistan couldn't get a council house, thus continuing the Mail's policy of whipping up anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant hatred based on misinformation.

The PCC code is very clear on such matters. Section one, clause one says:

i) The Press must take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted information, including pictures

And they've gone further on the subject of asylum seekers, issuing a note to editors that says:

"The Commission – in previous adjudications under Clause 1 (Accuracy) of the Code – has underlined the danger that inaccurate, misleading or distorted reporting may generate an atmosphere of fear and hostility that is not borne out by the facts."

So obviously after I pointed out that Littlejohn had published inaccurate, misleading or distorted information that generated an atmosphere of fear and hostility that is not borne out by the facts, there was only ever going to be one outcome:

Commission’s decision in the case of Stable v Daily Mail

 

The complainant considered that the article falsely stated that “Afghans climbing off the back of a lorry in Dover” were given precedence in the allocation of council housing.

 

The Commission acknowledged the complainant’s concern over the statement; however, it had to consider the remark in the context of the article in which it appeared. The article had been clearly presented as a comment piece, in which the columnist expressed his concern that a soldier who had served in Afghanistan had not been granted a council house. The Commission considered that the columnist had exaggerated and simplified the example of housing immigrants for the purpose of stressing his assertion that the “system of government exists simply to punish those who do the right thing”. It emphasised that the newspaper should take care when using such rhetorical methods of expression that readers would not be misled into understanding that they reflected statements of fact. In this instance, on balance it considered that readers would be aware that the columnist was not accurately reflecting the government’s policy on the housing of immigrants, but that he was making an amplified statement for rhetorical effect. It was therefore the Commission’s view that, on this occasion, readers generally would not be misled in such a way as to warrant correction under the terms of Clause 1 (Accuracy) of the Code of Practice.

The covering letter notes that I can't complain about the decision or ask them to reconsider, but notes that they'll forward my letter to the editor. You couldn't make it up.

Now that the PCC has been quite clear that it's OK for journalists to lie for rhetorical effect, I think I'm on safe ground when I say that Richard Littlejohn is a fine, upstanding journalist, the Daily Mail is a wonderful publication whose employees can be proud to work for it, and that the Press Complaints Commission is an effective, relevant and entirely useful organisation that continues to make an excellent case for ongoing self-regulation of the UK media.

Snowpocalypse Now

I tweeted a link to this last night but thought it was worth sharing with the widest possible audience, not to mention preserving for posterity.

With epic snowfalls reported across the north-east and Scotland suffering its coldest November night since records began, you can't blame local journalists for trying to get a bit of the Snowmaggedon action. Unfortunately over in East Anglia things weren't looking quite so dramatic yesterday lunchtime, so the Norwich Evening News had to resort to this:

I've been checking back all day and there's still no update on whether the icy wall of death has plummeted down onto the innocent shoppers below.

If anyone has other examples of snow-related non-news I'd be delighted to hear about them in the comments.

A letter to Eric Pickles

I've just sent the following letter to Eric Pickles, following his "Winterval" madness over the weekend. I'll keep you all posted about any reply I receive...



Dear Secretary of State,

Several newspaper articles published on Saturday 27 November contained comments from you attacking the “politically correct grinches” who have declared a “war on Christmas”.

Despite your very public commitment to transparency there are no details of your statement on the Department for Communities and Local Government website, so I am forced to assume that you were quoted correctly when you said the following:

“The war on Christmas is over and the likes of Winterval, Winter Lights and Luminous should be in the dustbin of history. It is in councils’ financial interests to draw in shoppers to their town centres at Christmas. Shoppers want to see Christmas lights, Christmas trees, carol services and nativity scenes, and local councils should not hesitate to support them."

As many, many people have pointed out many, many times, the so-called “War on Christmas” is a tabloid invention. For example Winterval – which as it last took place more than a decade ago has already been consigned to the dustbin of history – was not a replacement for Christmas but a series of separate events that included Christmas.

Indeed, an official statement from Birmingham City Council published by the Guardian earlier this year pointed out that the Winterval event:

“was a promotional campaign to drive business into Birmingham's newly regenerated town centre. It began in early November and finished in January.”

Surely this is exactly what you are asking councils to do? The council statement continued:

"There was a banner saying Merry Christmas across the front of the council house, Christmas lights, Christmas trees in the main civil squares, regular carol-singing sessions by school choirs, and the Lord Mayor sent a Christmas card with a traditional Christmas scene wishing everyone a Merry Christmas".

This really doesn’t sound like a “War on Christmas” to me.

In 2008 Oxford City Council ran a two-month series of winter events, going under the banner of “Winter Lights”. Again, Christmas played a huge part in the season-long event. At the time, Oxford City Council issued the following statement:

"Oxford City Council has not 'banned Christmas' and has not banned the use of the word 'Christmas'. The Council has not even considered doing either of these. Oxford City Council will celebrate Christmas 2008 in the same way as it has celebrated all previous Christmases: we will have Christmas trees in the Town Hall and in Broad Street, the Lord Mayor will host a Christmas reception for community workers and will hold the annual Christmas Carols event, and we will be sending out Christmas cards.”

As before, if the council wanted to declare war on Christmas it chose a rather half-hearted way in which to do so.

The idea that Luton Council had tried to rebrand Christmas as Luminos to “avoid offending Muslims” has also been comprehensively rebutted and rejected. As with Winterval and Winter Lights, Luminos was the umbrella term for a series of events that included Christmas. Six years ago Luton Council issued the following statement, which is still available on their website:

Luton Council has reacted angrily to national newspaper claims that it has "cancelled Christmas" for fear of "offending Moslems". Reports in The Sun led to scores of people ringing the town hall to complain last Friday. But council officials dismissed the story as "utter nonsense", saying that the town's traditional Yule time celebrations were in full swing during the run-up to the holiday.

Explained an exasperated council leader David Franks: "The Sun decided to re-run an old yarn about a highly successful 'Luminos' weekend festival three years ago. We had started with a Friday lantern procession to mark Diwali and ended as usual with the traditional switching-on of the town's Christmas lights on Sunday. In between, there was a funfair in the town centre as an added attraction to Christmas shoppers.

"Everyone had a great time, apart from some sections of the media deciding we had "cancelled" traditional festivities. The reports were nonsense then and we were most annoyed to see The Sun repeat the lie three years later."

During the morning the Sun's error appeared in print, town hall staff were flooded with angry emails and telephone calls from misled members of the public. Said a council spokesperson: "We were able to pacify residents when we told them the story was wrong but we're worried that there still some Sun readers who believe this garbage. We have written to the newspaper pointing out their error but have heard nothing so far."

There is no evidence that any local authority in England and Wales has EVER attempted to “ban” Christmas, and the most basic online research shows that the three examples you cited over the weekend are nothing more than tabloid invention. They are simply not true.

With this in mind, can I ask when you will be making a public apology for making misleading and inaccurate statements to the press?

Alternatively, if you have any evidence to support your claim of a “War on Christmas” launched by “politically correct grinches” I would very much appreciate it if you could share it with the wider world. I’m sure your oft-stated commitment to openness and transparency will make such a release nothing more than a formality, but in case you need a nudge in the right direction I should point out that the Ministerial Code states:

“Holders of public office should be as open as possible about all the decisions and actions that they take. They should give reasons for their decisions and restrict information only when the wider public interest clearly demands.”

I think it would be hard to argue that there’s a public interest defence in not explaining exactly what you were thinking when you made this statements, so I look forward to hearing from you in the near future.

Merry Christmas,


P. Stable

More Mail Fail

The Daily Mail - whose readers may not agree with what someone says but will fight to the death for their right to say it - is predictably outraged after a Muslim (gasp!) artist put together a (pretty crappy) piece of work based around the London bus that was destroyed by the 7/7 bombers.



The story goes like this:

"A Muslim artist has sparked outrage with his depiction of the ripped-apart bus destroyed in the 7/7 terror attacks.

"The artwork shows four angels flying above the bombed number 30 bus - the same number of Al Qaeda terrorists who took part in the atrocity which left 52 commuters dead and maimed hundreds more on London's transport network.

"Also seen are scores of ghostly souls shooting from the bus, which was travelling through Tavistock Square when it was devastated by suicide bomber Hasib Hussain."

The paper hasn't bothered to check whether the four angels are supposed to depict the four bombers, they're just assuming that because the artist is a Muslim who said he "wants to shock people" his work must be a "tribute" to the murderers. Nor has the nameless journalist managed to find anyone who is "outraged" - the only third party quote comes from the father of a woman who died on the No 30 bus, who (understandably) says the artwork is "upsetting".

All typical Mail stuff, but not on its own worthy of comment. However, there is one aspect of the story that we can't let pass. As further proof that the man behind the picture is some kind of Al-Qaeda sleeper agent, the paper tells us that:

"The artist has also used photo trickery to write the message 'Outright terror... bold and brilliant' on the side of the bus."

Photo trickery? Or just "a camera"?

As has been noted many, many times one of the sad ironies of 7/7 was that the side of the bus was carrying an advert for the film The Descent. An advert that included a quote from a review in Total Film magazine. A review that said:

That's right, the evil Muslim Terrorist Artist has cunningly used, er... reality in order to make his work more shocking. How very dare he.

UPDATE!

Closer inspection of the story reveals there's even more to this than meets the eye. The BBC's coverage concentrates purely on the fact that using am image from 7/7 is controversial. The full quote given by the artist reads:

"What I'm trying to do is to make anyone that has a faith, a belief, or an idea they hold close to their heart to think about the impact of these ideas when they leave their heads. I wanted to jolt people into seeing the results of these thoughts put into action. It is a grotesque thing that happened. The inquiry is to establish the facts and find out out what happened and to make sure something like this doesn't happen again and that is partly what my image is trying to do. It is meant to make people think about the effects of faith." (emphasis added by me).

Do they sound like the words of someone who wants to "glorify" the bombings and "pay tribute" to the killers? Even the Sun didn't try and claim that four angles = four bombers (although it did point out that there were four of each), and at least it managed to point out that "Outright terror" was written on the side of the actual bus.

But over at the Mail, they're sticking with the story that the picture is an "angelic tribute" to the bombers, despite there being abosolutely no evidence to back up their claim. And the results in the comments section are fairly predictable:

Weather v Climate

With the sad predictability of an England middle-order collapse, respected scientist Richard Littlejohn is the first columnist to trot out this piece of HILARIOUS commentary:

"It’s late November and parts of Britain are under eight inches of snow. That’ll be the global warming, then."

By happy conicidence, today sees the release of a Met Office report that says 2010 is on course to be the hottest in recorded history. That'll be the global warming, then.

Mind how you go, Richard.