SCAN Case Study : Taito Phillip Field
On 2 February 2007 in the House of Representatives, Taito Phillip Field, MP, said:
“Yes. I take exception that in the past 17 months that member has continually made allegations about me in this House in question time. I want to make it clear to him that, in fact, a lot of the allegations he has made in this House are quite untrue and have reflected badly on my integrity. If that member has any scrap of evidence to back up the allegations he has been making for that lengthy period of time, I invite him to come out of his closet and make those allegations outside this House.”
SCAN analysis (completed 15 December 2007)
The subject said:
“I want to make it clear to him that, in fact, a lot of the allegations he has made in this House are quite untrue”.
Please notice the following:
“..quite untrue…” – not “untrue” or “false”.
“quite untrue” is a very mild term to reflect emotions.
The subject did not say all of the allegations are quite untrue, only that “a lot” of the allegations are quite untrue.
This should bring us to conclude that some of the allegations are true.