Tabloid Watch has scored a direct hit in its analysis of an "exclusive" Sunday Express splash, BBC snubs our bomber boys. It was nothing more than a gratuitous attack on the BBC based on falsehood.

The story's intro said:

"The BBC was facing an angry backlash last night over its decision to snub the unveiling of the Bomber ­Command Memorial next week... The corporation has consigned live coverage... to little-watched digital channel BBC News, rather than to BBC1 or BBC2 which will be showing live tennis from Wimbledon during the 35-minute service."

Of course, the paper's reporters managed to stitch together quotes from people willing to bellyache about the matter. But they were, it appears, subject to an old reporting trick.

I tracked down two of them and discovered some interesting facts.

In one case, the man had offered critical quotes about the BBC on the basis of being given what he described as "inaccurate information" by the journalist who called him. Now aware of the BBC's coverage, he is not complaining.

In a second instance, Jim Dooley, financial director of the Bomber Command Association, told me his quotes were given after he was asked this direct question:

"Would you prefer the unveiling of the memorial to be shown live on BBC1 or to see a repeat of Bargain Hunt?"

As he now says, his answer was obvious. But, like anyone who deals with the press, he was also relaxed about it. "If you boys get it 51% right, I suppose that's ok."

He went on to tell me about his fund-raising efforts for the event and was much more exercised about the Ministry of Defence's failure to provide money than about the BBC's coverage.

And that takes me to the other named person in the story, the defence minister, Gerald Howarth, who was quoted as saying:

"It would be extremely disappointing if there wasn't full and comprehensive media coverage of this national event."

This is a typically nuanced political remark that makes no specific reference to the BBC. Almost anyone would say as much, or as little. His press office have yet to return my request for an explanation as to how it came about.

So, to sum up, there was no backlash because the quotes were, in essence, confected. Nor, of course, was there any justification for referring to the BBC as snubbing the event.

As Tabloid Watch pointed out, this non-story was exposed in the final paragraphs, which was a quote from a BBC spokesman:

"We are aware of the significance of this story, both for the ­veterans and for our audiences. The midday service is being filmed for later inclusion in a special programme Bomber Command: A Tribute on BBC2 at 5pm. The BBC News Channel is also currently planning to carry the service live at midday."

And then came the final killer quote from that same spokesman: "The Bomber Command Association are happy with our plans and have been working closely with us."

Some snub, eh? Some backlash. In other words, the story was fallacious nonsense.

So why did the Sunday Express run it? Go to Tabloid Watch for the likely answer.

Meanwhile, think also of this story in the context of the Leveson inquiry. Here is a national newspaper that sells 500,000 copies an issue. Its track record on accuracy has been noticeably poor.

As we reach the concluding segment of the inquiry into the standards, practices and ethics of the press the Sunday Express cavalierly publishes on its front page a blatantly biased and inaccurate story. No action is taken.

Yet Lord Justice Leveson is upset enough by a Mail on Sunday story about himself, alleging that he threatened to quit, to call in the reporter responsible.

Without wishing to suggest he may be overly thin-skinned, if the story was untrue, then I can understand why he was annoyed. He is getting a taste of what it's like to be subject to falsehoods.

But he and his team also need to grasp the significance of the Sunday Express story too, for several important reasons. First, it's part of a pattern - an example of routine national newspaper misbehaviour.

Second, the reaction to the story from the rest of Fleet Street is simply to ignore it, accepting with a collective shrug that such nonsense is par for the course.

Third, this story appeared in a newspaper that has been withdrawn from oversight by the current system of (non) regulation, the Press Complaints Commission. So nothing could be done by its good offices.

Fourth, if it had been part of that system, the PCC would have entertained a formal complaint from the BBC. But, of course, the BBC is so used to being rubbished in the press that it wouldn't bother to make one anyway.

The corporation takes the view that it cannot spend its time complaining about ridiculous tabloid stories. So the drip-drip-drip of anti-BBC articles are allowed to build up and fester among their licence payers.

It is a sorry tale all round, is it not?