Mr Joseph Horner complained that the newspaper had published the inaccurate and distorted claim that "of the Arctic sea ice, 75% has been lost over the past 30 years" in breach of Clause 1 (Accuracy) of the Editors' Code of Practice.

The newspaper accepted that the claim was misleading and published a clarification statement explaining that the figure, which was supplied by Greenpeace, came from research by the University of Washington Polar Science Centre into sea ice volume and not the more commonly discussed "sea ice extent" or area. The newspaper also published an article that discussed the editorial dangers of quoting statistical information without further explanation. The complainant was happy to resolve the complaint on this basis.