Day 055 - 25 Nov 94 - Page 07
1 Q. Is there anything you want to say about number 11?
2 A. This section is the only section in this appendix which
3 refers to health. It does not specifically say "nutrition"
4 but, by implication, this section deals with advertising in
5 relation to nutrition.
6
7 This is an extremely small section and, given the concerns
8 that there are about children's nutrition, the ITC, I feel,
9 needs to review its Codes of Practice in the light of the
10 Health of the Nation and give greater priority to health
11 and nutrition. Now, we are talking about the old code, and
12 I know there are proposals to amend this.
13
14 Q. We will come on to those later. But what about the
15 spirit ---
16 A. Yes.
17
18 Q. -- recognised by this present section; what do you want to
19 say on that?
20 A. The ITC looks at individual adverts, and I feel that is
21 a shortcoming of its present system. It has no procedure
22 for looking at the sum total, the cumulative effect of
23 advertisements.
24
25 Each advertisement is judged individually. So, for
26 example, in 11A, where it says, "Advertisements must not
27 encourage children to eat frequently throughout the day",
28 that is interpreted as that one particular advertisement.
29 So it would not be appropriate, for example, in one
30 advertisement, to show a child eating frequently throughout
31 the day. Yet the sum total of advertising messages that
32 children receive is that they do encourage children to eat
33 frequently throughout out the day.
34
35 Now, I think, whether eating frequently throughout the day
36 is a good thing, obviously, we do all eat frequently
37 throughout the day. The question is: what kinds of foods
38 are being eaten frequently throughout the day? There are
39 certain foods which are not recommended as being eaten
40 frequently throughout the day -- for example, confectionery
41 advertising.
42
43 Q. That is coming up next, is it not? Do you want to refer to
44 these?
45 A. That specifically refers to bed-time. I wanted to make
46 the point that, for example, the high level of advertising
47 for confectionery does show the confectionery being
48 consumed or in relation to a number of different situations
49 and, therefore, the overall effect is to present a picture
50 of consumption at different times, different places and
51 frequently throughout the day; yet the ITC implementation
52 of this Code does not deal with that and does not concern
53 itself with that. I feel that that is a significant
54 shortcoming of the present Code of Practice.
55
56 Q. So their interpretation of the letter of 11(a) is, when it
57 says "advertisements", they interpret that as meaning
58 individual advertisements?
59 A. Yes, indeed they do; whereas I believe -----
60
