The majority of complaints made to the Press Complaints Commission, which raise a possible breach of the Code of Practice, are resolved directly between the Commission’s staff, editors and complainants.

These are either settled to the express satisfaction of the complainant following some remedial action by the editor or are not pursued by complainants following an explanation or other response from the publication.

Below are summaries of the latest complaints involving the regional press which fall into the first category.

The Northern Echo
Helen Hopper complained that an article reporting that her husband – a driving instructor – had been acquitted of a sexual assault charge against one of his students was misleading. She said that the article had failed to include the following information about the claimant: that she had accused her previous driving instructor of inappropriate behaviour; that she had telephoned this previous driving instructor minutes before making her complaint about Mr Hopper to the police; and that she had self harmed five days before making the complaint. She also said that the article had misconstrued the references to his flirty language in text messages as they were intended to reflect his open and jokey manner with his customers. (Clause 1)
Resolution: The newspaper said that it could not include every detail given in court and considered its coverage to be fair and accurate. However, the complaint was resolved when the newspaper offered the complainant’s husband the opportunity to contribute to a follow-up article on the perils of being a driving instructor. The newspaper said that such a feature would be another way of underlining his innocence.

Leicester Mercury
Mr and Mrs S M Lowe of Leicestershire complained that an article reporting that their son, Daniel, had been detained under a Mental Health Act hospital order inaccurately reported the details of his court hearing. (Clause 1)
Resolution: The newspaper published a correction making clear that Daniel was subject to a hospital order rather than ‘jailed’ as the headline of the article inaccurately stated. On the other points raised by the complainants, the newspaper obtained a copy of the court transcript which showed that the article did indeed contain an inaccuracy. To this end, the newspaper published the following correction: