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By judgement of 5 October 2000, the Court of Justice of the European Communities annulled Directive 98/43/EC on the advertising and sponsorship of tobacco products. The Directive, adopted pursuant to Articles 100A and 57 of the EC Treaty (now Articles 95 and 47) laid down a general prohibition of advertising and sponsorship relating to those products. It was aimed at eliminating obstacles to the functioning of the internal market deriving from barriers to the movement of products and the freedom to provide services and distortions of competition resulting from differences in the national rules....

The Act of 1 August 2000 reforming the audiovisual sector (see report in this IRIS) inserts four articles concerning the Internet in the Act of 30 September 1986 (as amended) in Section 6 entitled "Provisions concerning on-line communication services other than private correspondence". The provisions were introduced during the parliamentary debate on the initiative of the member of parliament Patrick Bloche in reaction to recent case-law on the matter (cases involving Estelle Halliday and Lynda Lacoste; see IRIS 1999-5: 3 and IRIS 2000-1: 12), and have been much amended. The new Articles 43-9 and...

After three years of preparation and any amount of being passed back and forth in Parliament, the Act reforming the audiovisual sector, aimed in particular at strengthening the public sector and opening the way for the development of terrestrially-broadcast digital television in France, was adopted on 29 June. Apart from a few minor points, most of the text was declared to be in compliance with the Constitution by the Constitutional Council on 27 July. Firstly, the Act restructures public-sector audiovisual communication, making considerable amendments to the Act of 30 September 1986. The central...

The Hessen state authority for commercial broadcasting (LPR Hessen), which is responsible for monitoring the programmes of private broadcaster RTL-2, has complained that an episode of the TV show Big Brother contained illegal surreptitious advertising. On 16 May 2000, an episode of the controversial TV programme Big Brother, in which several volunteers are confined in a building cut off from the outside world and monitored round the clock by cameras and microphones (see IRIS 2000-3: 7), showed these people building a model railway. The manufacturer's name, which appeared in unusually large characters...

Since 1991 the Flemish Broadcasting legislation, with some modifications, stipulates a ban on advertising immediately before and after children's programmes. In a time period of 5 minutes before and after programmes targetting children under 12, no advertising or sponsorship messages are allowed. For many years the commercial broadcasting organisation VTM and its second channel Kanaal 2 have been opposed to this provision of the Broadcasting Decree and have sought the abrogation of the 5-minute rule. A decree proposed in the Flemish Parliament some months ago, however, went in the opposite direction...