L'Ombre de l'Olivier

The Shadow of the Olive Tree

being the maunderings of an Englishman on the Côte d'Azur

06 April 2007 Blog Home : April 2007 : Permalink

Nonapologetic Apology

I have always felt that Private Eye has issued the best grovelling apologies for stories that M'learned friends have decided were excessively economical with the actualité, where they grovel for the wromg bits but somehow still manage to remind  you that other retails turned out to be true. However I may have found a challenger in this area as the Inquirer website produced a magnificent example yesterday:

THE INQUIRER wishes to apologise unreservedly for the story we published on Tuesday March 27, 2007 in which we stated that the Halifax Bank was writing to its customers to advise them that details of their accounts had been stolen.

We now accept that this story was factually incorrect in that, while the confidential data had indeed been stolen, no such letter was sent.

Correspondence seen by The Inquirer reveals that the stolen briefcase containing data on 13,000 mortgage customers has been recovered unopened and the bank has decided it's not necessary to let customers know that the theft happened and doesn't wish to cause them worry by informing them of the fact that its employees routinely carry detailed listings of customers' financial affairs around with them in an extremely insecure manner.

So that's alright then.



I despise l'Escroc and Vile Pin