PCC 'to consider' Gately complaints
PCC 'to consider' Stephen Gately complaints
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Monday, 19, Oct 2009 04:21
The Press Complaints Commission (PCC) has said it will consider an article written about the death of Stephen Gately, after receiving a record number of complaints.
By Lewis Bazley.
The commission received more than 21,000 complaints over the weekend regarding a column in the Daily Mail by Jan Moir, entitled "Why there was nothing 'natural' about Stephen Gately's death", later changed to "A strange, lonely and troubling death".
Following the article's publication and discussion on social networking sites such as Twitter, thousands of complaints were made to the PCC while advertisements accompanying the piece online were later removed.
Outrage over Mail's Gately article
A statement from the commission released on Monday confirmed the complaints received represented the highest number of grievances ever filed about a single article.
"The PCC generally requires the involvement of directly-affected parties in its investigations, and it has pro-actively been in touch with representatives of Boyzone - who are in contact with Stephen Gately's family - since shortly after his death," the statement added.
"Any complaint from the affected parties will naturally be given precedence by the commission, in line with its normal procedures.
"If, for whatever reason, those individuals do not wish to make a complaint, the PCC will in any case write to the Daily Mail for its response to the more general complaints from the public before considering whether there are any issues under the code to pursue."
Following the online uproar at her article, Moir issued a statement clarifying - but not apologising for - her work and describing the response to her article as a "mischievous" and "heavily orchestrated internet campaign".
"Some people, particularly in the gay community, have been upset by my article about the sad death of Boyzone member Stephen Gately. This was never my intention," she commented in a statement issued by her representatives.
"Stephen, as I pointed out in the article was a charming and sweet man who entertained millions. However, the point of my column - which, I wonder how many of the people complaining have fully read - was to suggest that, in my honest opinion, his death raises many unanswered questions. That was all."
The PCC website had crashed on Friday following the publication of Moir's original article as it struggled to cope with the volume of complaints.