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Lovers complain over seafront proposal story

A regional daily’s light-hearted story about a couple who got engaged on Brighton beach ended in a complaint to the press watchdog.

The Brighton-based Argus apologised to Lucie Collier and Joseph Batstone over the story headlined ‘A love of Labour leads to romantic proposal.’

Lucie had complained to the Press Complaints Commission that the headline suggested they were Labour Party campaigners.

The complaint was resolved when the PCC negotiated the publication of a published correction and the newspaper penned a private letter of apology to her.

The correction read: “The Argus would like to apologise to Lucie Collier and Joseph Batstone for inaccuracies in a story dated Tuesday May 31, 2011 with the inaccurate headline  ‘A love of labour leads to romantic proposal.’

“We would like to clarify that Miss Collier and Mr Batstone have never campaigned for the Labour Party or for any other political party and only their love for each other was what led to the romantic proposal.”

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