Reverend and Mrs Chave Cox and the Irish Daily Mail
The Press Ombudsman has decided that the Irish Daily Mail made an offer of sufficient remedial action to resolve a number of complaints made by the Rev. Guy and Mrs Heather Chave-Cox about breaches of Principles 1 (Truth and Accuracy), of the Code of Practice for Newspapers and Magazines in articles published on 23, 24 and 27 August 2010. A number of other complaints were not upheld.
The articles were about events in Rosses Point concerning a property in the area, in which Mrs Chave-Cox has a beneficial interest. Rev. and Mrs Chave-Cox complained under Principle 1 about a number of statements in the articles, including one in the first article that ominous legal letters had been sent to locals in Rosses Point telling them that they had 28 days to hand properties over to ‘rightful owners’. They complained that in the second article they were both described as absentee landlords who were demanding ground rents from distressed residents and that, in the third article, it was stated that a number of householders in Rosses Point said they were alarmed after receiving letters from a lawyer’s firm saying the real owners considered them to be ‘wrongfully in possession of their property’, and that Mrs Chave-Cox admitted to issuing a letter giving 28 days’ notice to one person.
The complainants stated that only one 28-day letter had been sent to a local resident, that it was not sent by Mrs Chave-Cox, but by representatives of the Middleton Estate, and that the letter was in connection with a vacant property. They maintained that on these grounds the statements about which they complained were significantly inaccurate. The newspaper offered to publish a clarification and apology stating that only one 28-day notice, and not several, was sent to a resident of Rosses Point, that it had been sent by the Estate, that Mrs Chave-Cox was in the area at the time on holidays, and not to research her rights (as stated in one of the articles), and that Rev. Chave-Cox was not a shareholder of the Estate and had no claim to any land in the area. This offer was not accepted by the complainants.
The inaccuracies mentioned above were significant, and therefore a breach of the Code of Practice. However, the offer made by the newspaper of a clarification and apology represented sufficient remedial action on its part to resolve this part of the complaint.
A number of other complaints were not upheld
The newspaper disputed the significance of a number of other statements that were the subject of complaints under Principle 1 about alleged errors of historical fact. While the evidence of the complainant supports the view that these statements reflected, at least, a lack of attention to detail, none of them, if inaccurate, was significant enough to warrant a decision that it breached Principle 1 of the Code of Practice.
A complaint under Principle 3 that the behaviour of a reporter and a photographer had been a breach of this Principle’s injunction against harassment is not upheld. While the involvement of these journalists was evidently persistent to a degree, and unwelcome to the complainants, their behaviour did not, on the balance of the evidence, constitute harassment.
A complaint was made under Principle 4 that reasonable care was not taken to check facts before publication, and that a number of particular statements in the articles therefore resulted in attacks on the integrity of the Rev. Chave-Cox in particular, and on the reputation of his wife and of the Middleton Estate.
The reporter concerned made a partially successful attempt to interview the complainants prior to the publication of the first article and, on the date of publication of the first article or shortly afterwards, he contacted the solicitors for the Middleton Estate, rang the complainants directly (although they were not at home) and sent an email to the Middleton Estate. While the second article’s repetition of the errors might have been avoided if additional information had become available in the interim, there is insufficient evidence that this gap in the information process was the responsibility solely of the reporter concerned. The third article, moreover, contained a significant amount of new information from an email sent by Mrs Chave-Cox to a different journalist, some of which clarified the facts at issue, and reported a number of significant facts attested to by Mrs Chave-Cox. In these circumstances, the complaint under Principle 4 is not upheld.
Under Principle 5, the complainants maintained that the publication of the address of the Rev. Chave-Cox’s church was unnecessary and irrelevant. As this is public information, this complaint is not upheld. They also complained under Principle 5 about the use in the article of 27 August of material from an email, which they described as private, sent to a journalist from another newspaper on 25 August, details of which were published in both papers simultaneously on August 27. The exchange of an email between two reporters, to one of whom it was sent for publication, is not in breach of Principle 5 of the Code of Practice.
Under Principle 8, the complainants maintained that the effect of the material published was to stir up hatred against them on the basis of their nationality and religion, and complained about a number of postings to various blogs and facebook entries. The complainants provided evidence that a number of postings of an abusive and threatening nature to them personally had been made on blogs and websites and on the Rev. Chave-Cox’s church’s facebook page. However, the primary responsibility for such objectionable comments must, in all except the most extraordinary circumstances, be borne by the posters themselves. The complaint under Principle 8 is therefore not upheld.
04 March 2011
The complainants appealed the decision of the Press Ombudsman to the Press Council of Ireland.