Call-TV spotlight shifts to Channel 4

Channel 4 is facing a nervous wait to find out if Ofcom will impose sanctions over You Say We Pay following the tough stance the regulator took in dealing with Channel Five over the Brainteaser fiasco.

After premium rate phone service regulator Icstis today fined You Say We Pay phone line operator Eckoh £150,000, Ofcom is set to investigate Channel 4 over potential breaches of the broadcasting code relating to two points.

Ofcom will be looking at broadcasting code rules 2.11 and 10.10.

Rule 2.11 states: "Competitions should be conducted fairly, prizes should be described accurately and rules should be clear and appropriately made known."

Rule 10.10 reads: "Any use of premium rate numbers must comply with the code of practice issued by Icstis."

Last week Ofcom fined Channel Five £300,000 for breaching the broadcasting code over premium rate phone quiz Brainteaser, made by Endemol UK subsidiary Cheetah, in relation to faking winners and misleading the audience.

Ofcom warned broadcasters when it issued the Brainteaser fine that future cases would be dealt with "extremely seriously".

Hitting out at the regulatory process today, Eckoh criticised the fact that it seemed to be a "lottery" that the Brainteaser case was only investigated by Ofcom - and not by Icstis as well - whereas You Say We Pay is being reviewed by both bodies.

However, Brainteaser and Five were only investigated under rule 2.11 of the broadcasting code because the issue of misleading the audience and faking winners was fundamentally an editorial and production-based one - not to do with Icstis and the premium-rate phone system used by the show.

This is a fundamental difference between the case against Brainteaser and the investigation facing Channel 4.

Channel 4 is also being investigated over rule 2.11 but the root of the issue, the broadcaster claims, is not editorial but technical.

The broadcaster claimed it had no knowledge of the irregularities in the phone service run by Eckoh while Five was more directly involved in the fake winners fiasco, because it is ultimately responsible for any editorial lapses by the show's production team.

However, a key section of the Ofcom committee ruling against Five stated that even when third parties are to blame the broadcaster holds the license and is ultimately responsible.

"It was the committee's view that irrespective of the arrangements regarding a programme's production, ultimately it remains the broadcaster's responsibility, as the licensee, to ensure full compliance of all its broadcast content with the code," Ofcom said in its adjudication against Five last week.

"Reliance on a third party does not diminish a broadcaster's responsibility under its license to comply with the code.

"Therefore a broadcaster must have sufficient checks and balances in place to ensure that compliance is effective, especially given the risk that a third party might not (as in this case) alert the broadcaster to problems that occurred."

If Ofcom finds Channel 4 in breach of the broadcasting code it could impose sanctions including a fine of up to 5% of "qualifying" revenue or, as the regulator did over the Celebrity Big Brother racism row, order Channel 4 to broadcast a "summary of findings" on TV.

Source: Media Guardian