The Times newspaper 'distorted' its coverage of a foster case in which a five-year-old Christian girl was placed with Muslim foster parents, the press regulator ruled today.

For three consecutive days in August 2017 the story dominated the newspaper's front page and was followed up by several other papers and websites. It said the girl's foster carers stopped her eating bacon, did not speak English and forced her to remove a necklace with a cross on it.

The Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) upheld a complaint from Tower Hamlets council about the accuracy of the Times' reporting and a notice of that ruling is printed on the paper's front page today.

The complaint specifically related to the third front page headline, which read 'Judge rules child must leave Muslim foster home'. The council said it implied the judge had ruled against them when in fact the council has sought to remove the child from her foster home and place her with her grandmother, who is also a Muslim.

Ian Brunskill, the paper's assistant editor, admitted the story and its reporting had cause 'enormous offence'.

He told MPs on the home affairs committee investigating into the reporting of minorities had caused 'an enormous amount of trouble for us, for other people'.

He said: 'It's caused enormous offence, it's caused enormous upset.'

However he denied the paper set out to cause offence.

But Harun Khan, secretary general of the Muslim Council of Britain, said the ruling was the first time a front page story about Islam had been corrected.

'It is about time the Times was forced to apologise for promoting what was widely known to be an inaccurate, misleading and bigoted narrative about Muslims.

'We hope that this will mark a turning point in the tolerance the Times has shown for anti-Muslim bigotry in its coverage and commentary.'

Miqdaad Versi, who leads the MCB's work on media reporting on Islam, said the ruling was 'too little, too late'.

He said: 'While Ipso's ruling on this shameful incidence of anti-Muslim reporting is welcome, their response thus far has been too little, too late. The note on the front page is welcome but cannot be considered even due prominence given this story was on four front pages.'

Will Tuckley, chief executive of Tower Hamlets council, said: 'From the start we had concerns about the validity of the allegations about the foster carers.

'For example one allegation was that they did not speak English, even though that is a prerequisite for any foster carer.

'The allegation that the foster placement was a bad choice by the council was also found by Ipso to be distorted information.'