The cross-party Women and Equalities Committee’s report on The Rights of Older People, published this morning, is critical of the failure of the complaints-handler to have any provisions to protect the public from ageism in the press.
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The report finds that the omission of ageism from the Editors’ Code “…[leaves] older people unprotected and [contributes] to a widely held perception that ageism is taken less seriously than other forms of discrimination.”
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The Editors’ Code is a standards code written by newspaper editors, under the authority of the newspaper executive body the Regulatory Funding Company. IPSO is required to use this code for handling complaints against member newspapers.
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Hacked Off Chief Executive Nathan Sparkes said, “IPSO is failing the public on multiple counts, across press ageism, other forms of discrimination, invasions of privacy, intrusion into grief, inaccuracy and more. In over ten years it has never investigated nor fined a single newspaper.

“Ordinary people are suffering the consequences of IPSO’s ineffectiveness every day. The Government’s failure to step in and implement the Leveson reforms, to replace IPSO with a genuinely independent and effective press regulator, is letting down the public.”
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ENDS
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Notes

Full report here:
https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/46686/documents/239426/default/
See paragraphs 41 to 49.

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