By Hamish MacKay

An English award-winning former news editor has entered the debate on growing disquiet over ‘increasingly ludicrous complaints’ being investigated by the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO).

Bob Haywood, who was news editor of Birmingham’s Sunday Mercury for close on 20 years, has shared his concerns over the time of UK regional newspaper editors being taken up by ‘palpably absurd’ complaints to IPSO.

Haywood spoke out after HoldTheFrontPage (HTFP) reported on a complaint made by Gordon McDaid against the Greenock Telegraph, which was rejected by IPSO, in which McDaid claimed his privacy had been breached when the daily newspaper covered a road crash in which he had been involved and a photograph revealed his name and telephone number on the side of his van.

In its successful defence, the Greenock Telegraph pointed out that McDaid had written his name and telephone number on the side of the van and said these details would have been seen by anyone who passed the collision. However, it still removed the story from its website as a ‘gesture of goodwill’.

Haywood told HTFP: ‘Is it me – or are the complaints to IPSO getting barmier by the week? Your report of the regulator’s ruling on a piece in the Greenock Telegraph made me choke on my cornflakes. At least IPSO seems to be getting it right by throwing out these increasingly ludicrous complaints but it must be having a drip-drip effect on editors. It is troubling that the Greenock Telegraph removed the online story as a gesture of goodwill. Goodwill to whom… the nutty complainant presumably? When I was news editor of the Sunday Mercury I handled dozens of complaints. If we’d had a complaint like the one involving the Greenock Telegraph, we would have made a gesture to the complainant – but of the two-fingered kind’.

He added: ‘I have no wish to overcomplicate this, but does IPSO have the powers to tell complainants to pee-off if the complaints are palpably absurd, as in this latest example. This would save the times of their investigators and that of harassed editorial managers at the complained-of titles who have to keep a straight face and respond to [the complaints]’.

HTFP points out: ‘In a rare move, Bournemouth Echo editor Diarmuid McDonagh has also publicly criticised a totally spurious complaint his newspaper has dealt with recently. And as far back as 2017, then Daily Record editor Murray Foote was complaining that the workload caused by dealing with IPSO complaints was burdensome and that journalists were having to jump through hoops to prove we are correct‘.

In its annual report for 2020 – the most recent available – IPSO revealed it investigated only 496 out of 30,126 complaints raised. The watchdog found 29,377 complaints were not in its remit, with 24,270 not raising any possible breach that would merit investigation. The previous year, it probed only 621 out of 9,766 complaints made.

An IPSO spokeswoman said: ‘Anyone can make a complaint to IPSO about editorial material or journalistic behaviour that they think breaches the Editors’ Code. Last year IPSO received over 30,000 such complaints. IPSO is conscious of the need to focus investigation and mediation efforts on complaints that are potential breaches and is fully committed to upholding the high standards set by the Editors’ Code in a proportionate way’.

• This does not surprise me one little bit. And it won’t surprise readers of The Democrat either. West Dunbartonshire Council uses the excuse that we won’t join IPSO as a cover up for the fact that they keep trying to gag our digital news platform and to ban and boycott us by refusing to answer questions from us. They can’t take bad publicity even when it’s justified. Their latest piece of stupidity relates to a request we made last week to re-send us an e-mail with pictures of the Blitz Anniversary service in Clydebank. They still have not replied presumably on the basis that we are persona non grata and their ban is sine die. If they have problems with Latin or our use of big words, we would be glad to help them with them. One word they seem to have really big problems with is democracy, but then so does Putin.  They haven’t a clue about freedom of the Press and they come across almost as stupid as the complainers in the article above. Bill Heaney, Editor, The Dumbarton Democrat.
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• Alex Salmond and First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.

  It doesn’t look as if former Scotland First Minister Alex Salmond’s controversial talk show nor Dundee-born former Labour MP George Galloway [once a candidate to run for Westminister in Dumbarton]’s regular contributions, on television channel RT, formerly Russia Today, will be aired in the near future – if ever.Salmond was forced to suspend his show on the state-backed channel on the eve of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. And now RT has been silenced by media watchdog Ofcom which has revoked its licence to broadcast in the UK.The move came after Ofcom said it does not consider RT’s licensee, ANO TV Novosti, fit and proper to hold a UK broadcast licence. There had been 29 ongoing investigations by Ofcom into the due impartiality of RT’s news and current affairs coverage of the invasion of Ukraine.

  Ofcom explained: ‘We consider the volume and potentially serious nature of the issues raised within such a short period to be of great concern – especially given RT’s compliance history, which has seen the channel fined £200,000 for previous due impartiality breaches. In this context, we launched a separate investigation to determine whether ANO TV Novosti is fit and proper to retain its licence to broadcast’.

  The Ofcom investigation took account of a number of factors – including RT’s relationship with the Russian Federation. It has recognised that RT is funded by the Russian state, which has recently invaded a neighbouring sovereign country.

  Ofcom added: ‘We also note new laws in Russia which effectively criminalise any independent journalism that departs from the Russian state’s own news narrative – in particular in relation to the invasion of Ukraine. We consider that given these constraints it appears impossible for RT to comply with the due impartiality rules of our Broadcasting Code in the circumstances.

  ‘We recognise that RT is currently off air in the UK, as a result of sanctions imposed by the EU since the invasion of Ukraine commenced. We take seriously the importance, in our democratic society, of a broadcaster’s right to freedom of expression and the audience’s right to receive information and ideas without undue interference. We also take seriously the importance of maintaining audiences’ trust and public confidence in the UK’s broadcasting regulatory regime.’

  Dame Melanie Dawes, Ofcom’s chief executive, said: ‘Freedom of expression is something we guard fiercely in this country, and the bar for action on broadcasters is rightly set very high. Following an independent regulatory process, we have found that RT is not fit and proper to hold a licence in the UK. As a result, we have revoked RT’s UK broadcasting licence’.

  3.
  Another two journalists have been killed during the fighting in Ukraine, bringing the total of those killed operating behind the Ukrainian lines to four by 21 March.

  Two journalists working for US TV company Fox News were killed just outside Kyiv. Veteran Fox News cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski, 55, died after his vehicle came under incoming Russian artillery fire in Horenka. Pierre was an Irish citizen who had grown up in Leopardstown, Co Dublin. Married to a former BBC journalist, he had been living in London for the last 15 years.

  Ukrainian journalist Oleksandra Kuvshynova, 24, known as Sasha, was killed in the same incident. Fox News said she was ‘serving as a consultant, helping crews navigate Kyiv and the surrounding area while gathering information and speaking to sources’.

  Fox News Media chief executive Suzanne Scott said: ‘It is with great sadness and a heavy heart that we share the news regarding our beloved cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski. Pierre was a war zone photographer who covered nearly every international story for Fox News from Iraq to Afghanistan to Syria during his long tenure with us. His passion and talent as a journalist were unmatched’.

  
  4.
  The Times newspaper gained an average of 1,000 new digital subscribers a day during the first two weeks of the Russian invasion of Ukraine – one of its highest-ever growth rates.

  The head of digital at The Times, Edward Roussel, told Press Gazette that the increase came due to a mixture of people seeking out a trusted brand and the way the newsroom has innovated in response to covering the war. He said The Times surpassed 400,000 digital subscribers earlier this year after gaining 60,000 digital subscribers in 2021. It is now planning to expand its reach on social media by investing in staff and joining TikTok.

  Roussel pointed out: ‘The trend that we are seeing is that in moments of crisis – whether it’s the onset of coronavirus or Brexit – you see this shift towards trusted brands… The previous times when we have had that type of rate have been more connected with things like flash sales. But as a journalist, what’s interesting is when you have these moments of high drama: it’s where newsrooms really innovate’. He explained that the five main ways The Times newsroom had been innovating its coverage during the conflict were more 24/7 reporting, video, audio, data visualisations and audience interaction.

  On the importance of video, he said: ‘If you look at the role of video today, compared to the last time there was a major war in Europe which was 30 years ago during the Bosnian-Serbian crisis, it’s obviously night and day, it’s completely changed… And it shifts the challenge towards verification of content’.

  Roussel said The Times is working with groups like Storyful to help it verify any social video it uses. For data visualisations related to the war, the title is ignoring data submitted by the two governments involved and focusing instead on third-party sources like the Institute for the Study of War.

  Up to seven journalists from The Times and Sunday Times, including veteran war correspondent Anthony Loyd and foreign correspondent Louise Callaghan, have been reporting on the ground in Ukraine at any one time, often producing exclusive social media reports and appearing on Times Radio on top of their traditional duties.

  Roussel said 24 February, the day Russia began its invasion of Ukraine, was ‘the biggest day in Times Radio’s history’ in terms of total listening hours online and via the app and smart speakers. The station launched in June 2020.

  5.
  I am always on the look-out for interesting, clever headlines and The Scottish Sun has obliged with a beauty. ‘What a bunch of anchors’ was the headline on its front-page lead story on the move by ferry operator P&O in sacking 800 of its workers and replacing them with cheaper agency staff.

  The media generally attacked the P&O management with The Mirror describing the ‘despicable billionaire chiefs’ behind the sackings as ‘scum’.

  

• Hamish MacKay is the media correspondent of The Scottish Review where his entertaining and informative column appears weekly, usually on a Wednesday.