A TV advertisement, featuring John F Kennedy, extolling the virtues of wind energy was yesterday deemed unlawful by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland because the advertisement was politically linked to policy development and wind energy guidelines and was intended to influence government policy in respect of energy.
This proves that Ireland still has strong independent oversight in some areas. The complaint was made by Francis Clauson who owns the first Passiv House in Ireland. Amazingly, his annual heating bill is now lower than his PSO Levy bill, that is used to pay for wind turbines.
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Unfortunately, the wind lobby was more effective than the Passiv House lobby.
Full article on the wind advertisement can be found here.
Quote from your link:
ReplyDeleteThe Broadcasting Act 2009 and the BAI General Commercial Communications Code prohibits persons and organisations from using radio and television advertising to influence government policy, even in the case of causes and issues which might be supported by some or indeed a large portion of the population.
A very good law, but TV and radio broadcasters themselves (such as the BBC) spend a lot of each and every day trying to influence govt policy. A typical example might be a "news" report about some "green" charity calling for something that the broadcaster likes. I wonder if this law could be used against broadcasters themselves?
Its a very good question, would be worth putting in a complaint next time some green loon comes on the news
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