The press watchdog has rapped a regional daily for inaccurately interpreting the law in an article.

The Independent Press Standards Organisations has upheld a complaint against the Nottingham Post after it ran a piece online about nine plants in the UK that it claimed could lead to fines when grown in an individual’s garden, with the headline describing them as “criminal”.

The article prompted a complaint from Neil Jones, who said it was not illegal to grow any of the plants listed.

Complaining under Clause 1 (Accuracy) of the Editors’ Code of Practice, Mr Jones said it was inaccurate for the article to state that “spotting prohibited plants growing on your property is easy to do when you know what to look for”, to pose the question of “which plants are considered criminal in the UK?”, and to claim that “it is considered an offence by law to let any of the following plants grow outside in your garden”.

He also noted that The Weeds Act 1959 contains no standalone restriction on growing the plants named in the Act, or allowing them to grow on private property – absent of a “control order”.

Standing by its interpretation of The Weeds Act 1959 as the source for its claims, the Post also said the claim that “it is considered an offence by law to let any of the following plants grow outside in your garden” was supported by government guidance, titled “Invasive non-native (alien) plant species: rules in England and Wales”, which stated that a person could be fined.

The Post did however accept that the following statement in the original version of the article included a typographical error: “It is considered an offence by law to let any of the following plants grow outside in your garden.”

In light of this, the article was amended to remove the word “in” and a footnote clarification was also published.

IPSO noted that the article stated at the outset that “it is usually not illegal to grow [these plants] in your own garden”, but it then went on to refer to the plants as “prohibited plants growing on your property” before stating “[w]hich plants are considered criminal in the UK?” and “[i]t is considered an offence by law to let any of the following plants grow outside in your garden”.

It was the Committee’s view that those latter, absolute statements about illegality were not qualified by the earlier section of the article and gave the impression that it was a criminal offence for someone to have the listed plants in their garden in any circumstances.

IPSO also ruled the article had claimed – as fact – that it was “an offence by law to let any of the following plants grow outside in your garden” when this was not supported by the legislation upon which the article was based.

The complaint was partially upheld, and the full adjudication can be read here.