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Product Placement
October 5, 2006 4:20 PM
By Diana Wallis MEP
By Diana Wallis MEP
Back in the spring I sought views from people on my email list on the issue
of product placement and I just wanted to update you on where we are.
As you will recall the background to this issue is a piece of legislation
going through the European Parliament called 'Television without
Frontiers'. One of the components of this is to liberalise the use of what is termed product
placement (defined as the inclusion of, or reference to, a product or
service within a programme in return for payment or other valuable
consideration). The European Commission wants to leave the choice to
member states whether to authorise product placement or not, but the
proposal asserts it must be subject to some obligations, i.e. the product
placement must be made clear in some way at the beginning of the broadcast
concerned, the goods may only be placed not praised, product placement must
not take place in programmes for children, and some goods, like tobacco and
prescription medicines, may not be placed.
There were many interesting responses and I would like to thank everybody
who took the time to reply.
Interestingly, there was broadly equal support between those who were
happy with product placement and those opposed. Those who supported it
wanted it on the basis of the conditions as proposed by the Commission,
Some went further and said that product placement could be extended beyond
commercial television and onto the BBC, although several people said that
this extension should be on the condition that the BBC's licence fee be
reduced accordingly.
Those who opposed broadly mentioned the same three points:
'Too much advertising already'
'Children susceptible'
'Could lead to dumbing down'
There was also concern about defining where product placement ends and
where sponsorship begins. People seem to be more sympathetic to
sponsorship of programmes, which is very much the norm, of course, on
commercial television in the UK.
A further issue has emerged since my earlier correspondence and that is
whether the newer platforms for broadcasting, such as via the internet,
should be treated in the same way as the more traditional ways of
broadcasting. There is a view, which I support, which says the newer
platforms as embryonic industries should be allowed a more flexible
approach as far as product placement is concerned, whereas traditional
platforms ought to be more restrictive.
So where do we go now? Well, there will be a debate in my committee
(Internal Market) in the European Parliament today, Wednesday, with a vote
on Thursday. As the rapporteur on behalf of the Liberal group I shall be
making the points that have been raised by you and others (you can
probably imagine the amount of lobbying there has been, from all sides, on
this piece of legislation!). 'Television without Frontiers' will probably
be voted on in the full plenary of the Parliament in November.
At the same time when we have the final proposal which will go to the
Plenary I hope to have the opportunity to get wider feedback from
constituents across Yorkshire & the Humber.
Once again, many thanks for taking the time to respond. I will let you
know what happens.
Regards,
Diana
P.S. if you would like more information on the issue form what are
essentially two opposing points of view I can recommend:
Ofcom
www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/product_placement/product.pdf
or
The European Consumer's Organisation
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