OTTAWA – A radio contest that encouraged the use of handheld cell phones while driving, contrary to Quebec’s highway safety code, did not breach the CAB’s code of ethics, the Canadian Broadcasting Standard Council (CBSC) has ruled.
Corus-owned CJMF-FM (93.3) in Quebec City broadcast a promotional contest last October where listeners could win a rebate on a Bluetooth hands-free cell phone device, or the device itself, if they were spotted driving while using their cell phone, an act which had recently become illegal in Quebec.
A listener complained to the CBSC that the radio station was promoting an illegal act – driving while holding and using a cellular telephone. He also maintained that the promotion would entice people to break the law in order to win the contest.
But the radio station said that its intention was to encourage drivers “to do the right thing”, namely, to use a hands-free device if talking on a cell phone while driving.
The CBSC’s Quebec Panel examined the complaint under the clause of the CAB’s code of ethics which requires that broadcasters shall take care to ensure that its promotions are “not […] potentially dangerous or likely to give rise to a public inconvenience or disturbance.”
In its decision released Wednesday, the Panel said that:
“the broadcaster’s perspective [wa]s more realistic. The Panel doubts very much that people would begin driving while holding their cell phones in order to win a prize of inconsiderable value. To choose an extreme example, if the station had proposed awarding a new car to persons violating the recently amended Highway Safety Code, it would be more inclined to view the promotion as a serious incentive. That was not the nature of the promotional outcome in this case.”
The Panel also acknowledged that the promotion caused some confusion, and suggested that the broadcaster could “have chosen another way to move listeners into the recently legalized ambit of the Highway Safety Code.”
