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Virgin Trains goes to IPSO over regional daily reader’s letter

A regional daily has challenged the press watchdog to stand by a past ruling about fact-checking readers’ letters after a complaint by a rail operator.

Virgin Trains went to the Independent Press Standards Organisation over a letter, published by the Yorkshire Post, which it said had inaccurately claimed the company, along with another operator, had “pocketed the profits and skipped out of paying the government £2.2bn in premiums”.

In its defence, the Leeds-based daily cited an IPSO ruling involving the Maidenhead Advertiser earlier this year, in which the watchdog found it was “neither reasonable nor desirable to expect editors to verify every fact contained in published letters”.

However, the Post then offered to publish a clarification before IPSO was required to make a ruling on the complaint.

Virgin

Complaining under Clause 1 (Accuracy) of the Editors’ Code of Practice, Virgin said the piece, billed as an “open letter” from Trade Union Congress Yorkshire & the Humber regional secretary Bill Adams to Transport Secretary Chris Grayling, had not taken any profits from the East Coast franchise, but had lost more than £200m as a result of their investments.

In addition, it said that the letter inaccurately suggested that Virgin Trains had reneged on its contractual obligations, when in fact it had fully met its contractual obligations, including in relation to premium payments.

Denying a breach of Code and citing the previous ruling involving the Advertiser, the Post said the letter was a reflection of its writer’s views, which reflected other media coverage on the matter.

It also noted that the other company mentioned in the letter had made profits for a period of the franchise, and offered to publish a letter in response from Virgin.

Virgin responded that a right of reply or letter was not an appropriate remedy when the article contained an error of fact, and the Post subsequently offered to publish a clarification.

Virgin said this resolved the matter to its satisfaction, and IPSO did not make a ruling on the complaint.

The full adjudication can be read here.

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  • October 2, 2018 at 9:52 am
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    If you publish a defamatory letter you run the risk of being sued as publisher of a libel. You would need to prove the truth of the contents in court.
    As good a reason as any for either throwing out dodgy letters or verifying facts.
    Basic journalism really.

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