PCC rejects claim of inaccuracy by Lord Foulkes

The Press Complaints Commission has ruled that the Sunday Herald did not breach the editors' Code of Practice when it reported concerns about a paid consultancy involving the peer and MSP, George Foulkes.

A front page story on 1 February reported that a complaint had been made to the Holyrood Standards Commissioner about Lord Foulkes undertaking lobbying and consultancy work for Eversheds law firm. While there was no dispute that such a complaint had been made, Lord Foulkes said he had told the newspaper prior to publication that a similar previous complaint had been rejected by the Standards Commissioner - yet the newspaper had not included that information in its report. This failure, he said, was likely to mislead readers.

The Commission disagreed. The fact was that a new complaint had been made and had yet to be decided by the Standards Commissioner . The newspaper was entitled to report this. The article did not seek to give a view about the merits of the complaint, and it included a quote from the complainant expressing confidence that it would be dismissed. In these circumstances, "there was no obligation on the newspaper to publish a fuller explanation about why the complainant thought it would be dismissed". Even so, Commissioners welcomed the subsequent publication of a letter from Lord Foulkes, setting out the background in more detail.

To see the adjudication in full, please click here.

For further information please contact Stephen Abell on 020 7831 0022.

5/6/09