Thanks to JH for sending this - a ruling from the UK based IPSO.

The ruling itself is well worth a look. It notes:

The headline of an article published on 4 June which reported on a book by the political advisor Ed Husain was amended following publication to remove the suggestion that more than one town visited by the author had residents who reported 'no-go areas' for white people. We are happy to set the record straight.

  1. The publication further said that there was no intention on the part of the publication to imply that the experiences of the men interviewed in Blackburn applied to the other towns and cities referenced in the article, and it said it was regrettable if any such inference was taken. Nevertheless, it noted that upon reading the article, it would be clear to readers that the author's experiences in each town were carefully and individually described, and no assertion was made within the body of the article that the "no-go areas" reference was made in relation to all the referenced towns and cities. It also noted that neither the author of the book the article summarised, or the publisher of the book, had contacted the publication to flag any issues with the accuracy of the article. It also said that the theme of segregation was a running theme of the book, and provided excerpts from the book which it said demonstrated that this was this case; for instance, an individual was quoted within the book as having said that: "They chase out the white English businesses. After the riots in 2001, all the white businesses left. I don't say they throw stones at us like the white folk say. I say there is racism and reverse racism." It said that it had not referred to these other examples of segregation due to the length of the article; therefore, only the specific reference to Blackburn was included in the article.

And:

9. The publication also noted that it considered it to be "extremely unlikely that reasonable readers would have taken the impression from the headline that entire towns in Britain are […] entirely inaccessible to white people" and that any such confusion would be quickly resolved by a cursory reading of the article. The publication was therefore satisfied that, while it was happy to amend it, the original headline was not significantly inaccurate nor misleading.

Not sure how I'd interpret "British towns that are no-go areas for white people" as not conveying the impression that "entire towns in Britain are […] entirely inaccessible to white people". IPSO didn't agree with the Mail Online either.

Findings of the Committee 15. In this instance, the headline claim that there were "British towns that are no-go areas for white people" was not supported by the article. The article included no reference to a town or towns which were claimed to be off-limits to white people, and only one area within a city was described as a "no-go area" for white people. The publication had sought to support its headline by pointing to extracts from the book on which the article was based, which it considered demonstrated that segregation between white and non-white or Muslim people occurred in multiple towns. However, these extracts had not been included in the article and in any case did not amount to claims that the towns were "no-go areas". As such, the headline was inaccurate and was not supported by the text of the article, and therefore amounted to a breach of Clause 1 (i).

 

Any other good examples of this sort of stuff from the year?