Telegraph Issues Correction for Errors in Boris Johnson’s Column

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The U.K.'s Daily Telegraph published a correction on an article written by Boris Johnson before he was prime minister in which he misinterpreted a pile of data to suggest the British economy was set to outperform the rest of Europe.

Johnson wrote in the June 3 article that the U.K. was forecast to become the largest and most prosperous economy in “this hemisphere.” The correction published on Saturday said the data was based on an OECD forecast of U.K. and German GDP from 2020-2060 and that it related to Europe and not the northern hemisphere.

“This forecast did not predict that the U.K.'s GDP will surpass Germany's to become the largest in Europe,” the newspaper also said. “This was the columnist's own extrapolation of this data beyond the time-frame of the forecast.”

The correction was issued following a ruling by the Independent Press Standards Organisation, the Telegraph said. Johnson became the prime minister in the month after the article was written.

To contact the reporter on this story: Prejula Prem in London at pprem1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alaric Nightingale at anightingal1@bloomberg.net, James Amott, Lars Paulsson

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