Regret the Error

The Pandora column on 8 and 23 August referred to Ian McCartney and his advisory work for Fluor. We have been asked to make it clear that Mr McCartney personally receives none of the remuneration for this role: part of the fee is used to employ someone in the House of Commons from his Makerfield constituency and the rest is used to support the Women’s Interlink Foundation (www.womensinterlinkfoundation.org ), a charity based in India which provides disadvantaged women and children with drinking water, health treatments, housing and education. We apologise to Mr McCartney for not including this information in the letter we published from him and for the subsequent misleading Pandora item. Link

It has come to our attention that in recent years, we, The Media, may have mistakenly given the impression that Victoria Beckham was a figure of ridicule. Certain articles and other items pertaining to the popular Spice Girls singer could have led readers to question her talent and integrity, it has been found. Indeed, some remarks relating to the well-known entertainer and mother of three were open to misinterpretation as criticism of her, and may have been received by some readers as such.
Now, a lengthy and in-depth inquiry has proven that Mrs Beckham is beyond reproach. Moreover, she is known to be respected as an International Style Icon and celebrated as the pinnacle of British culture. We therefore accept that everything we said before was wholly misleading and untrue, and issue an unreserved apology. We hope that Mrs Beckham can forgive us for this inaccurate reporting, which we now withdraw without exception.
The exhaustive investigation carried out by us, The Media, has found that the false and ambiguous reports concerning Mrs Beckham began as early as 1994, when she enlisted as a member of the band, henceforth known as the Pop Geniuses, the Spice Girls. During these early days of her meteoric and wholly deserved rise to fame, her enigmatic smile and aspects of her reserved personality led certain sections of The Media to mislabel her grace and natural reserve, referring to her, with clumsy affection, as “Posh”.
This was not, of course, intended to signal standoffishness or lack of charm; in fact, the intention was to convey respect and deference. However, last week it was found that elements among the less-educated reaches of the reading public may have misunderstood this complex frame of reference, believing the appellation to be a joke, a nickname or a form of sport. We would like to insist that this was not the case.
Over the years that followed other aspects of our, The Media’s, unfettered enthusiasm for Mrs Beckham, her career and her place in the national culture have been equally inelegantly expressed. For instance when, in 2000, some of the younger and less experienced members of ourselves, The Media, began to refer to her admiringly as Skeletal Spice, there were those among the public who assumed this to be a sign of disapproval or disrespect, we have been informed. Naturally we can rebut this inference wholeheartedly. Likewise, any reference, circa 2004, to a Ms Loos or persons of a similar nature was either the product of the writer’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any persons (living or dead), events or locales was entirely coincidental.
Nor, we are pleased to clarify, is this investigation, our apology or any of the events heretofore pertaining, timed to reflect or in any way coincide with the reading public’s staunch refusal to hate Mrs Beckham and their insistence on buying her stylish new clothing range. As we are happy to point out, we, The Media, have been keen supporters of Mrs Beckham since day one, and any indications to the contrary have been entirely in the imaginations of you, the reading public. Shame on you. In fact, many of us in The Media have had Pops, or Posh Crops, since even before last week. Though they have never suited us quite as well as Mrs Beckham’s does her.
We are happy to make this clear wholly, entirely and unreservedly, whatever you may think.
Sincerely,
The Media Link