Remarkably, there is one respect in which the IPSO Editors Code is more stringent than the law. That is in respect of headlines. Clause 1(i) of the Code says this; “The press must take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted information or images, including headlines not supported by the text”.

It was on this provision that the late Queen succeeded in a complaint against The Sun, whose infamous headline “Queen backs Brexit” was judged by IPSO to be a headline which was not justified by the text of the article. Last week, IPSO adjudicated against one of the regional news websites owned by Reach, previously The Mirror Group, which featured misleading, clickbait headlines which were corrected by the main text.

The first article was headlined: “State pensioners issued NEW update over free bus passes being ‘scrapped’ by Labour”. There had in fact been speculation that the Government might scrap bus passes, but the story quoted a Labour spokesman saying that there were “no plans to withdraw” the scheme.

The second headline read: “State pensioners issued NEW update over Labour ‘scrapping’ triple lock”. However, in the article itself, Rachel Reeves was quoted saying the Labour Party was, “committed to keeping the triple lock, not just for one year, but for the whole of this Parliament”.

Against Reach’s denials, IPSO determined that both articles breached Clause 1 of the Code of Practice, and Birmingham Live published corrections as ordered by IPSO at the top of each article.

Had the headlines been defamatory of an individual or company, but also corrected in the article itself, a libel action would have failed on what is known as the Bane and Antidote principle.

Arguably the most famous example of this was in 1995, with Ian Smith and Anne Charleston, better known as Harold and Madge Bishop from Neighbours. They sued for defamation when The Sun published an article which showed their faces superimposed on the near-naked bodies of models apparently engaged in sexual intercourse, with the headline “Strewth! What’s Harold up to with Our Madge?” The body of the article made it clear that the photographs had been produced by a pornographer without their consent. The court decided that the obviously defamatory headline and photographs were neutralised by the accompanying text.

The purpose of attention-grabbing headlines has not changed, but the mercenary temptation to deploy them as “clickbait” is now greater than ever. This adjudication shows that IPSO will in the right circumstances act to sanction publishers who breach this provision of the Code.

In the Birmingham Live headlines, as is often the case, the publisher tried hard to justify these blatant Code breaches, advancing disingenuous arguments in response to the complaint. IPSO is sadly capable of accepting such arguments because of its institutional press bias. Such complaints are dealt with by lawyers at the newspaper, so they are best undertaken by professionals with the same skillset. This will make it more difficult for IPSO to reject a complaint.