Jane Wrightson: TV and radio watchdog an incentive to behave

COMMENT

Assertions in a Herald editorial about overeagerness by the Broadcasting Standards Authority, as well as calls by some broadcasters for self-regulation, suggest the authority's work is misunderstood.

The broadcasting industry enjoys considerable self-regulation. If the public wish to complain about a particular television or radio broadcast, they must do so first to the broadcaster (except for privacy complaints). That broadcaster can consider the matter alone, work out its own systems to address issues and, if necessary, put things right.

Generally, only if a complainant believes the matter has been dealt with inadequately can a complaint be referred to the BSA. The authority is, if you like, the appeal mechanism.

Many complainants would prefer to go to the authority directly. But the BSA agrees that broadcasters should deal with matters first and, given that they do, we are bemused at the suggestion that broadcasters are somehow constrained by the process.

The grounds for referral to the authority are carefully limited by broadcasting codes. Notably, these codes are devised by the broadcasters, another part of the system enabling broadcasters to exert considerable influence.

The codes (derived from the Broadcasting Act) allow complaints to be lodged on grounds as varied as fairness, balance, accuracy, good taste and decency, breach of privacy, law and order, violence and protection of children.

Mere subjective negative reaction by the audience is not enough for a complaint to succeed. We live in a society in which a robust, healthy tension exists between the right to access and the right to be protected from material that might upset.

Thus the provision of accessible guidance for parents, plus encouragement of media literacy so audiences can develop clear-eyed critical faculties, is essential to enable informed choice. New Zealand has much to do in this area.

It is the public, not broadcasters, whose role in the complaints system is circumscribed. Complainants must understand the broadcast codes, describe how the broadcast allegedly breached them and engage in further correspondence with us if they want to take the matter further. The requirements are not unreasonable but most complainants tell us that the process takes considerable time and energy.

It is a goal of the BSA to make the process as informal as we can but we cannot cut corners.

It is a high threshold above which complaints are upheld because of the proper acknowledgments we make to free speech and the Bill of Rights Act. Less than a quarter of complaints to the authority are upheld, not because we set out to impose a quota or because the system is too soft but because broadcasters, in general, act responsibly. When they do not, the reason for an independent mechanism becomes obvious.

For example, complaints lately upheld by the BSA include inflammatory comments by a TV host on a news matter involving Maori, partial comments on a radio programme about Pakeha critics, personal abuse levied by radio hosts, unfair interviewing techniques and adult TV programmes that have been too accessible to children. In each case, the issue boiled down to someone not being given a fair go.

It is curious that one broadcaster, in particular, regularly levels the accusation that because authority members are appointed by Government they are stooges on political matters. This is not so for any other statutory board or quasi-judicial authority and it is quite illogical - indeed offensive - that it should be so claimed about the BSA.

The debates that rage around our board table continue irrespective of which party is in government, and the tiny number of successful court appeals against authority decisions (four since 1989, out of more than 2000 decisions issued) indicates that members discharge their responsibilities carefully. They would not last long if they didn't.

You need a pretty thick skin to be involved in this business. Every decision handed down by the BSA will annoy the party whose case was not accepted. Some of the matters referred to the authority are not always particularly important in the big scheme of things.

But many other issues raised are critically important in a democracy, especially the obligation of the media to be fair as well as free.

The authority's very existence is a fine incentive for broadcasters to stay on their toes and to remind themselves continually of the incomparable potential of electronic media to harm as well as inform and entertain.

A popularity contest it is not, but a fair process indeed it is.

* Jane Wrightson, the Broadcasting Standards Authority chief executive, responds to a Herald editorial view that the BSA has been too keen to take on the Paul Holmes case.