• Statistics 2010
  • Introduction
  • The key numbers
  • What do people complain about?
  • Complaints with merit
  • Complaints without merit
  • Speed of service
  • Prominence
  • Desist requests and
    pre-publication advice
  • Complainant feedback and public opinion research
• Key rulings 2010

Statistics 2010

What do people complain about?

The major cause of complaint has, for many years, been inaccurate or misleading reporting. Last year, looking at those cases judged by the PCC to have merit, 87.2% raised such concerns - almost exactly the same proportion as in 2009.

In fact, the figures from the last two years in relation to the issues most commonly raised by complainants are remarkably consistent. As in 2009, the second major area of concern related to invasion of privacy and grief: 23.7% of complaints made reference to one of the Code's privacy clauses, slightly up from 21.4% in 2009.

People may wonder how the figures in this section add up to a total higher than 100%. The answer is quite simple: many complaints raise more than one issue under the Code. So if a complaint is made under Clause 1 (Accuracy) and Clause 3 (Privacy) it will be included in both categories.

Complaints about other aspects of the Code remained small in number, as the graphic below illustrates:

Another area of considerable statistical consistency relates to the sectors against which complaints are made. Looking at cases where investigation was warranted (i.e. the PCC requested a response from the relevant editor because the complaint appeared to raise a possible breach of the Code), it can be seen that 50.3% involved national newspapers, slightly down from 51.5% in 2009. Complaints against regional titles rose by just 0.4% to 33.7%. Scottish titles accounted for 8.7%, Northern Irish 2.1% and magazines 4.9%.