ANDREW DODD AGAINST THE POST

The Discussion

9. Principles (1) and (4) require articles to be accurate and opinions to be based on accurate facts. Principle (1) also requires publications to be bound at all times by accuracy, fairness and balance.
   
   Principle (1) says: Publications should be bound at all times by accuracy, fairness and balance, and should not deliberately mislead or misinform readers by commission or omission. In articles of controversy or disagreement, a fair voice must be given to the opposition view.
   
   Principle (4) says: A clear distinction should be drawn between factual information and comment or opinion. An article that is essentially comment or opinion should be clearly presented as such. Material facts on which an opinion is based should be accurate

Did the article link the discovery of the artefacts to the delay?

10. The Council finds that the article led a reader to reasonably conclude the discovery of the artefacts was the cause of the delay of the works. The article initially described the artefacts found on the site and reported:

“… the work in Champion St was paused to “protect the current find and ensure there were no other objects of interest”, but it continued in other areas of Bothamley Park.
The delay meant both lanes of Champion St … would re-open about mid-2024 instead of the end of this month. [February].”

The only “delay” described in the article was the “pause” mentioned in the article’s preceding paragraph. [Emphasis added]

Was the discovery of the artefacts the cause of the delay?

11. The Council’s role is not to determine the actual cause of the delay. However, the Council observes The Post had conflicting information as to what was going on at Bothamley Park.
12. The information Kāinga Ora provided the reporter did not focus on the delay but provided information on the project generally and the artefacts that had been found. Contrary to the complainant's claims, it does say that the archaeological find meant work was "paused". However it also said that work "never completely stopped" as the team was relocated to another part of the site.
13. Kāinga Ora’s Facebook post, as noted above, explicitly links the archaeology and the delay. It says the finds "meant our team had to stop working" and "this delay will now see both lanes of Champion Street re-open around mid-2024", a delay of several months. The Post relied on both sources for its story and those sources were unclear as to the true details of the delay.
14. Mr Dodd says the discovery was not the cause of the delay as the investigation of what was found only took a day. However, nothing in the information provided by Kāinga Ora, the lead agency for the project, provided that context or information.
15. We are unable to rule on whether or not the article accurately presented the cause of the delay. This is because even after hearing further submissions from both parties, the Council has conflicting information. As set out above it is not our role to investigate or choose between the conflicting information in the press release, the Facebook post, and from Mr Dodd – and indeed, between conflicting versions on what Kāinga Ora said to either party.
16. On balance, the Council recognises the conflict of fact lay with the agency and reporters should be able to rely on publicly available information. While best practice would have been for the reporter to pick up the phone and clarify the cause of the delay, the Council does not uphold the complaint based on the original article as published. The Council notes when The Post received Mr Dodd’s original complaint, it checked with Kāinga Ora whether the story was accurate. The Post says Kainga Ora had no issues with the article as published. 

Should the Post have done more once Mr Dodd raised his concerns?

17. Mr Dodd clearly had first-hand information and had raised legitimate questions about the way the delay had been reported. He had been the archaeologist on the site and could be expected to have an excellent knowledge of the artefacts that were found and how the find affected the progress of works. It would have been fair for the Post to at least have checked the facts with him, rather than just Kāinga Ora,  or to have raised his specific concerns with Kāinga Ora, and if not corrected, potentially added Mr Dodd’s view of events to the article. 
18. Therefore, we will uphold the complaint on this narrow ground.  We emphasise that we are not upholding in relation to the initial publication discussed above, but rather because of the failure of the Post to follow up Mr Dodd’s complaint when he approached it after publication of the article

Should The Post have sought comment from Mr Dodd before publishing?

19. The Council does not believe it was necessary for The Post to have sought comment from Mr Dodd before publishing the article. Mr Dodd was not named in the article itself, and comment was sought from Kāinga Ora, who had overall responsibility for the project.
20. The Post could have written an article primarily focused on the delay of several months of a major infrastructure project and on Kāinga Ora’s conflicting explanations for the delay. Had it done that, further enquiries could have been made with Kāinga Ora and perhaps Mr Dodd. However, choosing the angle on which to focus is a matter of editorial discretion and not a matter for the Council.

Were the artefacts portrayed sufficiently accurately?

21. The Council is satisfied that the description of the artefacts in the article as amended is sufficiently accurate for a general news article. In his complaint to the Council, Mr Dodd accepts “the finds listed in the article can be considered a reasonable summary of what was listed in the Kāinga Ora press release”. Kāinga Ora provided the photograph included in the article.  Reporters can reasonably rely on photos supplied by official sources and as previously noted, Kāinga Ora is the lead contractor on the project.

Decision

22. The complaint is upheld under Principle (1). This is because after Mr Dodd’s initial complaint, it was unfair to continue to link the delay to the archaeological finds without making adequate efforts to find out if this was true or adding the perspective of Mr Dodd, the archaeologist on the project, when he questioned the version of events in the story.
23. The complaint is not upheld under Principle (4). The article is a news story rather than an opinion piece and is better considered under Principle (1), which captures the essence of the complaint.

Dissent by Hank Schouten
The Media Council was unable to established that the story was inaccurate. As the ruling states, Kāinga Ora’s Facebook post linked the archaeology find to the delay in reopening a nearby street. The Post should have been able to rely on this publicly available information. Despite Mr Dodd's protests, Kāinga Ora did not correct its original statement or provide further information to clarify matters. If there was a fault it was with the message and not the messenger.

Council members considering the complaint were Hon. Raynor Asher (Chair), Rosemary Barraclough, Scott Inglis, Marie Shroff, Richard Pamatatau, Alison Thom, Ben France-Hudson, Clio Francis, Hank Schouten, Jo Cribb, Judi Jones, Tim Watkin and Katrina Bennett.