It appears that listener power and the doubts of Peter Horrocks forced the programme to change tack.
According to Press Gazette
The show asked listeners for their opinions on whether they back Kate and Gerry McCann, now back in Britain.
Listeners of the Victoria Derbyshire phone-in were asked: "Do you back the family and feel they have to fight their corner against the speculation or do you think that all those involved, including the media, should shut up and let the experts do their jobs?"
Listeners quickly decided that this wasnt a good thing to debate,one texting in that thery had lost a listener.
When Horrocks was interviewed by presenter Victoria Derbyshire he said
"This morning we have decided that it is not the most important story today, unlike this network which has been leading on this story," ......
"I am not sure that some of the debate you have been having which is encouraging people to speculate and give their views one way or another is something we would do in TV news coverage."
So listener power won in the end and the station was forced to abandon the phone in.
Footnote-Bob Piper draws our attention to contrasting press values when it comes to reporting
Consider how the British press handled two very different disappearances, the nights of 3 and 4 May 2007.
In early May two British doctors, Kate and Gerry McCann, were on holiday in the Portuguese resort of Praia da Luz. On the night of 3 May 2007 they went out to dinner at a tapas bar near their hotel, leaving their three-year old daughter Madeleine behind with their two other young children. At some point that evening, Madeleine left or was abducted from their unlocked apartment, and she hasn’t been seen since.
The night after the world’s most visible missing person vanished, early on 4 May 2007, at least 80 other people disappeared when a boat sank in the Caribbean. This time British authorities were directly involved in the disaster, and there is good reason to suspect that the deaths may have been the result of criminal negligence, if not of deliberate police violence. Some of the dead may have been eaten by sharks; many were women and children. A UK government enquiry is currently underway and the publication of its final report is due in August
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