Code compliance - it's fine by Ofcom...
Failure to comply with regulatory decisions landed DM Digital Television with a £17,500 fine last week. Ofcom
sanctionedthe free-to-air general entertainment channel, which broadcasts mainly in Urdu to the UK Asian community, for its “serious,” “repeated” and “systematic” failure to comply with ASA adjudications.
The ASA referred the broadcaster to Ofcom over three recent adjudications, two of which the ASA considered to be "sufficiently serious and repeated to be considered for a statutory sanction". The most recent ad in question had led one lovelorn viewer to hand over £1,510 in the belief that “spiritual healer” and occasional Cupid, Professor Mohammed Zain, would find her “a prince.” The ASA, fairly obviously, found the ad to be in serious breach of the BCAP code since it was “likely to exploit the hopes and fears of vulnerable viewers.”
The main concern for the regulators was not this one ad, though, but the fact that DM Digital had already been involved in seven other adverse adjudications by the ASA and Ofcom. This included one case where a programme broadcast by DM Digital contained unsubstantiated and potentially harmful claims that the programme sponsor was able to successfully treat medical conditions such as cancer, hepatitis and diabetes. As a result of this previous adjudication in October 2008, DM Digital had already been fined £15,000.
It was this continual disregard, be it misguided or deliberate, for the advertising and broadcasting codes that warranted the fine and a demand from Ofcom that the channel broadcasts a statement of Ofcom’s findings. The relatively modest fine, deemed “extremely excessive” by DM Digital, serves as an important reminder to broadcasters that regulators such as the ASA and Ofcom do have active procedures in place to reprimand compliance violations, and ones that they are very willing to use if the circumstances necessitate them.
Written by Rebecca Jones, summer vacation student.
