Between 5 and 7 April, a story was published on three associated local news sites in Dorset with the headline ‘Dorset court rules mother should have no contact with child’. The articles said that a judge in Bournemouth Family Court had made an order relating to a child who now lives with his father, that he will have ‘no contact’ with his mother. (They have been removed by the editors following our intervention which is why we aren’t linking to them.) The articles consisted mostly of quotes from a local solicitor.
However, it turned out that this wasn’t journalism but was simply publication of a press release prepared by a PR firm – what’s known as ‘advertorial’. It also turned out that the case, as described, doesn’t seem to exist.
The articles contained several errors, including inaccurate references to what was being called ‘The Transparency Project (TP)’. We wrote to the solicitor and the editors pointing out that the following statements were incorrect:
The articles referred to: ‘the new Ministry of Justice-backed Transparency Project (TP)’.
The Transparency Project is not new; we have been established for more than ten years. We are not backed by the Ministry of Justice and we are completely independent of government.
The articles went on to say:
‘In a bid to increase awareness of how family courts operate, TP allows reporting of cases held in private as long as it adheres to strict anonymity guidelines.’
We do not authorise or allow reporting of cases.
‘Following a trial scheme, TP became permanent in 2025 in England and Wales.’
This was presumably meant to refer to the Open Reporting rules, which weren’t relevant in this case. The publishers were not saying they had sent a journalist in to report from court.
We also pointed out that this opinion had no basis in fact relating to The Transparency Project:
‘[solicitor] said TP, coupled with her latest published case, together demonstrate how courts are moving away from traditional stereotypical gender perceptions in Children Act proceedings.’
Overall, the articles had muddled up:
- Publication of judgments guidance, dating from 2014
- Open Reporting court rules, dating from January 2025
- The Transparency Project, established in 2015.
The first editor apologised and deleted all references to us. He explained that he’d received a press release from the law firm that he’d published in good faith. He responded to our email so swiftly we’re not sure he checked who TP were any more thoroughly than he had the first time, but we thanked him for his prompt action. The solicitor apologised and said she was referring to transparency in general. She offered us a donation of £100 as a gesture of apology (which we didn’t think appropriate to accept).
We searched for the published judgment – because we thought the grounds for ‘no contact’ might make this an important decision – but couldn’t find it on TNA, so we asked the solicitor where it was. She referred us to: Re J (a Child) (No. 2) (ContactFollowing Change of Residence) [2025] EWFC 491 (B)
However this judgment does not include a ‘no contact’ order. As can be seen in paras 107-108, the judge made an order for indirect contact at least once a month. It was envisaged by the father that restrictions would have to stay in place until the mother undertook therapeutic work, although the judge acknowledged that this might take many months. It may be that the mother has little or no contact at present, but the judge didn’t make an order to that effect. We asked the solicitor to clarify – did she mean another case? No reply. However we think this must the case she was referring to, because the judgment [para 5] and the article both say the mother ‘had taken steps, time and time again, to undermine the father’s relationship with [child]’.
It’s very odd though that a PR firm would tell the local press a specific type of order had been made, when the lawyers and parties would know it hadn’t.
We were worried about this misinformation being published, especially when it appeared on the Facebook page of one of the newspapers and received dozens of (uninformed) comments with varying opinions about the judge and the parents, and some from individuals who may have feared for their own court case. Other comments were critical that the piece was just an advertisement for the law firm, as suggested by the way the firm’s contact details were provided in the article.
We then asked the editors to correct the ‘no contact’ point. The potential effect of this inaccuracy is probably much greater than mistaking court rules and guidance for The Transparency Project.
When we didn’t receive a reply to our second request, we complained to IPSO, the press regulator. We told IPSO we think this is a serious breach of the Editors Code (Clause 1 – inaccuracy) because:
- The articles present a serious mis-statement of the law.
- Many parents get involved in private law family proceedings without legal advice or representation, so it is important not to spread misinformation.
- There were dozens of comments on the Bridport News Facebook page indicating that most readers of the article now believe that a local judge made an order that completely ended the relationship between a child and his mother. Many of the comments were emotional or angry.
- The article infers that this law firm can help fathers who want to exclude their child’s mother from involvement in the child’s life to get a ‘no contact’ order.
- In reality, it is very rare for a judge to make an order for ‘no contact’ with either a father or a mother in private law proceedings. This would only happen where a parent posed serious risks of harm to a child, such that any contact would be harmful. Although the judge concluded that direct contact with this mother was not currently in the child’s welfare, he did not decide there should be no contact.
We eventually received an email from the first editor saying the story has been removed from their websites (we didn’t ask for this, just for a correction) and offering to publish a correction. We have sent in our suggested wording for that correction. We think it’s unfortunate that the editors didn’t check the original source material when the press release referred to a ‘published judgment’ which they could have accessed. They could also send their own reporters into court under the Open Reporting rules if they think cases like this are of interest to their readers. However, we do sympathise with the challenges faced by local news publishers.
Unfortunately, we can still see the original un-amended version of the article on MSN (Microsoft News) but it seems to have vanished from Facebook.
Now matters are in IPSO’s hands, we aren’t allowed to report our correspondence before an outcome, but it may be that the publication of a correction will limit the damage done by these errors.
Image: Photo of Bournemouth by Christophe.Finot, via Wikimedia Commons
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