In the January 2012 issue of MCFly just published, on page 3, I wrote of Manchester law firm Pannone, that MCFly had “asked them some questions [about their recent environmental work], not heard back yet. Watch this space.”

This was not true. On searching the MCFly email account, I have found one semi-related email to an individual Pannone person, but not one that could justify what I published.(1)

Therefore, Pannone is owed an apology for the implication that they ignored a request for information, and I offer that apology unreservedly. (2)

Now, whether or not it is libel (they’re the lawyers, not us!), it is definitely an inaccuracy.
Although it might be better to hope this was not noticed (after all, who reads MCFly?), that’s not the path I’m taking because;

a) it’s not how I want to operate
b) it’s always better to make an open apology unbidden, rather than after being exposed. (Unless… well, see the tag for this story)
c) uncorrected, the claim undercuts the tremendous amount of hard and frustrating work that my co-editor Arwa Aburawa has put in to contacting every other organisation mentioned in MCFly (you know who you are.)

What will  be done differently
MCFly will try twice by telephone and twice by email over a 48 hour period (excluding weekends) to reach an organisation/individual before stating that they have not responded. Claims that MCFly tried to contact an organisation without reply will be backed up with dates and times of phone calls and emails sent.
A more full policy on this will be discussed and published shortly. Reader comments and suggestions are welcome.

Marc Hudson
mcmonthly@gmail.com

Footnotes
(1) As they say, never spoil an apology with an excuse, but here goes anyway; I thought that I had contacted Pannone because I’d written a whole raft of questions about the Pannone press release on their achievement of ISO14001 on the Manchester Climate Monthly wiki which we use for germinating stories. I then conflated this memory with having sent the aforementioned semi-related email The crucial point is, I relied on my memory, rather than double-checking. Bad move, one I will make as sure as I can never to repeat.

(2) Pannone, who’ve been very very speedy today with responses to emails, have NOT sought this apology. I suspect they are not even aware of what has been written