Mea Culpa: lots and lots but we’re not exactly sure how many

Our tolerant stickler John Rentoul checks the style and syntax in last week’s Independent

Aisle be damned: Natalie Elphicke in fact ‘crossed the floor’ (PA)

There is an insurance company called More Than, which is a strange name for a business. It is just as odd as a way to start an article. On Wednesday we said: “More than 80 charities and civil society bodies have called on Rishi Sunak to reverse a decision to block a UK visit by the UN inspector on food poverty until after the election.”

This was even odder because the headline had already told us exactly how many charities and “civil society bodies” – couldn’t we find a better phrase? – had written a letter to the prime minister: 85.

Presumably we wanted to avoid putting the number 85 at the start of the sentence, but in that case the rule is to spell it out. There would have been nothing wrong with starting the report: “Eighty-five charities and pressure groups have called on Rishi Sunak…”