DOUG COLLINS

B.C. Press Council dismisses
News columnist's complaint

THE B.C. Press Council has
dismissed a complaint against the
Vancouver Sun by recently-retired
North Shore News columnist Doug
Collins, but criticized the Sun for
its handling of the issues.

The complaint concerned a
Nicole Parton column in the Sun
on Jan. 24 titled ‘Despite denials
racism abounds,”’ in which quota-
tions from a ‘“‘North Shore news-
paper columnist’? were cited as an
example of “the language of
hate.”’

The column was based on an in-
terview with Aziz Khaki, president
of the Council for Racial Justice,
who had been the subject of the
column from which the quotations
were taken.

Neither Collins nor his newspa-
per ‘vas nexied, but Collins said it
was clear that the reference was to
his column, because only one
newspaper is published on the
North Shore and he was the only
columnist who had written about
Khaki

The Collins column, published
Jan. 11, told of an effort by Khaki
to organize an advertisers’ boycott
of the North Shore News because
of the views expressed by Collins.

Collins charged that Parton had
ignored this background in quoting
from his column and therefore was
guilty of bad reporting.

In a second part of his corn-
plaint, Coilins told the Press
Council that the Sun had failed to
publish a Ietter to the editor he

wrote Jan. 30 in response to the
Parton column.

He saw this as a denial of the
right to reply. He said he received
only vague answers when he phon-
ed on two occasions to ask whether
his letter was to be published.

RETIRED News columnist Doug
Collins ...mo absolute right to have
letter published.

Frank Rutter, editor of the
Sun’s editorial page, pointed out
that Collins had responded to the
Partos column in his Jan. 29 News
column.

Rutter said the Collins letter was
not published because it dealt with
an issue that was not raised in the
Parton column and continued Col-
lins’ comments about Khaki.

The letter could have presented

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legal problems, Rutter told the
council, and he did not feel that
the Sun needed to get involved in
tire conflict between Collins and
Khaki.

Text of the Press Council’s ad-
judication follows:

“Nicole Parton, like any other
columnist, Mr. Collins included,
has the right to selectively use in-
formation — in this case, quota-
tions from Mr. Collins’ column —
to support her views. For this
reason, the coucil dismisses Mr.
Collins’ complaint of ‘bad repor-
ting.’

“While the council agrees that
Mr. Collins probably should have
been recognized as the author of
the quotations used by Mrs. Par-
ton, it disagrees with his conten-
tion that he had an absolute right
to have his letter to the editor of
the Sun published.

‘*No newspaper is obliged to run
every letter to the editor it receives.
However, in this case the Sun
could have considered explaining
to Mr. Collins more promptly why
his letter was not published, and
extending to him the opportunity
of submitting a different letter
dealing specifically with what he
saw as a personal attack.

“In spite of these considera-
tions, the council regretfully
dismisses this part of the complaint
on the technical grounds that
newspapers are not obliged to
grant automatic right of
response.”

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9 - Sunday, July 9, 1989 - North Shore News

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