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The Digital Switchover (Disclosure of Information) Act 2007 permits the Department for Work and Pensions and other public authorities to disclose information to the BBC and to any company that the BBC makes use of for the purpose of the Digital Switchover Help Scheme. Digital switchover and the end of analogue television broadcasting will be implemented in the UK in stages between 2008 and 2012. The Government decided to assist this process by establishing the Digital Switchover Help Scheme to provide assistance to those aged 75 or over, those with a severe disability or those who are blind or...

The English High Court recently ruled against the BBC in a case in which it undertook the “ultimate balancing exercise”: weighing the claimant’s Article 8 right not to have her privacy invaded against the Corporation’s Article 10 right to freedom to broadcast. The BBC planned to broadcast one of a series of programmes on the topic of adoption. The programme in question dealt with the issue of a woman (T) whose two-year old daughter was being handed over to a couple for adoption, the authorities believing this to be in the best interests of the child. It was planned that footage would be broadcast...

In recent months, the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers (CM) adopted five country-specific Recommendations concerning the application of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages: Slovakia (first monitoring cycle); Slovenia and the United Kingdom (second monitoring cycle) and Hungary and Norway (third monitoring cycle). The Charter contains a number of provisions of relevance for the (audiovisual) media, the most detailed of which are to be found in Article 11. The latest Recommendations on the application of the Charter highlight a number of pertinent issues. In respect...

Ofcom, the UK communications regulator, has fined the BBC GBP 50,000 for the unfair conduct of a premium rate telephone competition. It is the first time that the BBC has been fined. A report commissioned by Ofcom has also found that there are systematic failures in compliance in the running of such competitions by a large number of broadcasters; the costs to competitors of such unfair treatment may run into millions of pounds. The BBC case concerned a telephone competition run on the BBC children’s programme “Blue Peter”. It was unusual in two ways; firstly because the proceeds went, not to the...

“Manhunt 2”, made by Rockstar Games for PS2 and Nintendo Wii consoles, cannot be legally supplied for the time being within the UK. This follows the decision by the British Board of Film Classification - BBFC not to give it a classification. In 2003,“Manhunt 1” was classified “18”, i.e., no-one under 18 may rent or buy it. The BBFC stated that the principal reasons underlying its decision included: - The unrelenting focus on stalking and brutal slaying;- The sustained and cumulative casual sadism in the way in which killings are committed; and - its unremitting bleakness and callousness of tone....