BBC Newsnight last week broadcast an on-air apology to a woman from Tower Hamlets after she was portrayed inaccurately by a report which appeared on the prgramme.

Bethnal Green resident Shanene Thorpe, an employee of Tower Hamlets council, was interviewed by Newnight’s political editor Allegra Stratton in a report on changes to the welfare benefit system in May. She complained that the report implied she was unemployed, when in fact she balanced a job with bringing up her daughter, who was three at the time the piece was aired.

Newsnight published an apology on its website at the time, but Ms Thorpe campaigned for an on-air statement, gaining 27,000 signatures in an online petition. She said: “This has been a massive victory for me and now that the BBC has fully acknowledged their wrongdoing, I hope they’ll think twice about doing it to others.”