Research report prepared for the australian communications and media authority


Regulation of advertising and sponsorship on commercial radio



Download 0.63 Mb.
Page14/21
Date18.10.2016
Size0.63 Mb.
#2845
1   ...   10   11   12   13   14   15   16   17   ...   21

4.3Regulation of advertising and sponsorship on commercial radio


As with the UK, the impartiality obligations will form a backdrop to the rules on advertising and sponsorship.

4.3.1Definitions


Neither the RT Act 1988 (Ie) nor the BA 2001 (Ie) contains any relevant definitions.

The BCI Advertising Code contains a number of relevant definitions, which draw heavily on the TWF Directive definitions:328



  • Commercial Communication: Any form of announcement on radio and television coming within the recognised character of advertising, sponsorship and teleshopping or any other form of commercial promotion.

  • Advertising: Any form of announcement broadcast in return for payment or for similar consideration or broadcast for self-promotional purposes by a public or private undertaking in connection with a trade, business, craft or profession in order to promote the supply of products or services, including immovable property, activities, rights and obligations, in return for payment.

The term ‘commercial communication’ is a catch-all term and is used generally throughout the BCI Advertising Code when the rule is applicable to all forms of commercial promotion defined above. The definition of ‘advertising’ appears to be confined to the promotion of ordinary commercial activity; it does not cover broader uses of advertising which might be designed to promote viewpoints, policies, beliefs, or courses of actions. However, this is likely to be consistent with the impartiality obligations and the prohibition on political and religious advertising, and advertising in relation to industrial disputes. It should also be noted that the definition does not make clear to whom the payment or consideration is provided. It might be assumed that it is meant to refer to the licensee. If that is so, then a payment to someone else would mean that it is not an advertisement. The Guidance Notes do not comment on this. It is noted that the definition of ‘advertisement’ in the Advertising Standard is specifically drafted to include payments made to presenters or associates of presenters.

  • Sponsorship: Any contribution made by a public or private undertaking not engaged in television and/or radio broadcasting activities or in the production of audio visual works, to the financing of television and/or radio programmes with a view to promoting its name, its trademark, its image, its activities, its products or its services.

  • Surreptitious advertising: The representation in words or pictures of products, services, the name, the trade mark or the activities of a producer of products or a provider of services in programmes when such representation is intended to serve advertising and might mislead the public as to its nature. Such representation is deemed to be intentional if it is done in return for payment or similar consideration.

  • Product placement: The inclusion of, or a reference to, a product or service within a programme in return for payment or similar consideration to the programme maker or broadcaster for the specific purpose of promoting that product or service.

The definitions of ‘surreptitious’ advertising and ‘product placement’, a particular form of surreptitious advertising, are intended to cover disguised forms of advertising. These types of advertising will not take the form of traditional advertising, and so may not be readily apparent to the listener (or viewer). The definitions of ‘commercial communication’ and ‘advertising’ in the BCI Advertising Code would not seem to cover these forms of disguised advertising since they require “any form of announcement” to be a commercial communication or advertising. It is unlikely that product placement could be viewed as constituting an “announcement”. By contrast, the definition of an “advertisement” in the Advertising Standard might be broad enough to include the practice of product placement, given the wording: “…to promote, directly or indirectly…”.

4.3.2Advertising, sponsorship, and related rules

4.3.2.1Amount of advertising


There is a limit on the amount of advertising a commercial radio licensee can broadcast. Pursuant to RTA 1988 (Ie), section 10, a licensee must not broadcast advertisements exceeding 15% of the total daily broadcasting time, and within any hour a maximum of ten minutes must not be exceeded.

4.3.2.2Political advertising


There is a prohibition on advertising which is directed towards a political end. The prohibition also applies to advertising for a religious end or in relation to an industrial dispute (RTA 1988 (Ie), section 10). A political end is understood to be broader than ‘party political’.329 These rules are also set out in the BCI Advertising Code, section 9.

4.3.2.3General


Aside from the specific statutory obligations noted above, it will be the BCI Advertising Code which has most relevance to the regulation of advertising and sponsorship, and other commercial interests, in connection with news and current affairs coverage. The relevance is borne out in the section 1 objectives of the Code which, aside from the standard requirement that advertising be legal, honest, truthful, and decent, include:

  • To ensure that commercial communications do not impinge on the editorial integrity of broadcasts.

Section 3, which sets out the general principles, also includes a recognition that one of the purposes of the Code is that the preparation of commercial communications should be with “…a sense of responsibility both to the individual and society and shall not prejudice the interests of either”.

The BCI Advertising Code includes rules which cover specific concerns and specific practices. The following will or may have a relevance to news and current affairs programming:



One set of rules covers the principle of transparency. These rules address the need for identification of content and separation of commercial and editorial content. The rules associated with the Code principles, of which transparency is one, apply generally to the practices covered by the Code, whilst later provisions deal with specific practices such as advertising or sponsorship. Relevant rules associated with the principle of transparency include:

  • Rule 3.3 requires any commercial arrangement within programming to be transparent and the listener made aware of such arrangement. No definition is provided of ‘commercial arrangement’, but since this rule refers to the need for commercial communications to operate on a principle of transparency, it can be assumed that a commercial arrangement will be an arrangement connected with a commercial communication.

  • Rule 3.3.1 prohibits “…presenters and other on-air personnel…” advertising or endorsing products or services during editorial content. ‘Presenters’ etc are not defined, but the BCI Guidance Notes describe ‘on-air personnel’ to include “…reporters and regular guests or contributors”. The Notes also state that the prohibition applies to products or services with which the presenter or on-air personnel have “…a vested interest”. The Notes also emphasise the licensees’ responsibility to ensure that guests do not promote their products and services on-air.

  • Rule 3.3.2 prohibits advertisers or sponsors exercising any editorial influence over the content of programs.

  • Rule 3.3.6 prohibits commercial communications featuring persons who regularly present news programs. There is an exception for charity appeals and public service campaigns for health etc. The BCI Guidance Notes advise that this rule does not apply to persons who present current affairs programs. The responsibility for compliance rests with the licensee.

A set of rules deal specifically with advertising, and the following are relevant:

  • Rule 4.1 reiterates the principle of transparency by requiring commercial content in advertising breaks to be separate from program content.

  • Rule 4.2 also reiterates the transparency principle by requiring that advertising must not affect the editorial integrity and value of programming. Advertising is also required to be inserted in natural breaks. This rule addresses not just the need to ensure separation of commercial and programming content, but also the importance of programming content not being distorted by the inappropriate insertion of advertising. As noted, there are restrictions on the amount of advertising which is permitted, but this rule operates as an additional protection to ensure an appropriate balance between advertising and program content.330

  • Rule 4.8 also addresses the need to make clear the separation of advertising and other content by requiring advertising breaks to be signalled by visual or audio means. The signal itself should not contain a commercial communication.

Specific rules also govern sponsorship:

  • Rule 7.2 prohibits sponsorship announcements making promotional references to the sponsor’s product or services, although “generic branding slogans” are permitted.

  • Rule 7.6 prohibits the sponsoring of radio news programs.

Rules also address other commercial practices or influences. These rules are relatively straightforward prohibitions.

  • Rule 3.3.7 prohibits product placement, although it does not apply to incidental references to products or services where they are editorially justified. Such inclusion must not amount to undue prominence. This latter qualification is to avoid creating the impression that a product placement arrangement is in place.

  • Rule 4.9 prohibits surreptitious advertising.

4.3.3Other rules of relevance


Apart from the statutory rules noted above, there are no other rules of relevance. As noted above, the BCI Code of Programme Standards does not deal with any matters of relevance to this report.

4.3.4Application of the rules and/or related issues


There are almost no examples of BCI or BCC decisions relating to the rules reviewed here. A recent decision, concerning the public broadcaster, RTÉ, concerned the requirement under rule 4.8 of the BCI Advertising Code to ensure that advertising is clearly separated from other content by visual or audio means.331 This decision concerned two radio programs.332 In relation to the first, the broadcaster had not used an audio means but had made clear that the program had come to an end by an announcement. The BCC considered that the announcement of the conclusion of the program constituted a sufficient audio communication. In the second program, no audio cue was given. RTÉ argued that it was unlikely to cause any confusion and therefore no audio cue was needed. However, the BCC concluded that the issue of confusion was irrelevant: the only issue was whether the advertising break was signalled. In the case of this program, there was no signal to indicate the advertising break.


Download 0.63 Mb.

Share with your friends:
1   ...   10   11   12   13   14   15   16   17   ...   21



The database is protected by copyright ©ininet.org 2024
send message
    Main page
european union
active participation
australian communications
time frame
relevant sections
report does
regulatory framework
public space
following codes
standard does