Complaint
A viewer complained about the presenter’s reference to the Daily Mirror as a “left-leaning paperâ€, arguing it was evidence of political bias when no reference was made to the political perspective of other newspapers featured.  The ECU assessed the complaint against the standards of due impartiality set out in the Â鶹ԼÅÄ Editorial Guidelines.
Outcome
This was a brief reference to the political leanings of the newspaper in a review of the morning’s headlines.  The ECU accepted it might have been better to refrain from commenting on the leaning of this one paper, but against that the guidelines make clear that impartiality is resistant to precise quantification, and cannot be measured by a stopwatch or a count of words.  If the impartiality of the segment were to be judged on that basis, an argument could be made on the basis that more time was given to the Mirror’s editorial position than to other front pages.  Moreover, in the ECU’s view nothing was said which might have caused viewers to consider that the newspaper should be dismissed as being “atypical and so irrelevant†as suggested by the complainant, particularly given its strong criticisms of Boris Johnson were explored at length.  In that connection, the presenter characterisation of the Mirror’s political orientation helped contextualise the tone of its headline and drew a contrast with other newspapers.
Not Upheld