Are you fed up with ITV’s Formula One coverage being ruined by ad breaks throughout the race? Join the club!
There’s nothing worse than coming back from an ad break to find that something spectacular happened while we were watching the ads.
Well, actually there is something worse. It’s knowing that those ad breaks should never have been there in the first place.
As an investigative journalist - and author of the soon-to-be-published consumer self-help manual Sort The Bastards! – I’d always wondered why ITV didn’t simply put all of the ads into the parts of the programme that come before and after the live race. That would allow ITV to show the F1 race itself uninterrupted, just as the BBC used to do before it lost the rights.
Before I investigated, I assumed there were rules that prevented ITV from showing too high a concentration of ads in parts of the programme. It turned out I was wrong.
ITV is regulated by Ofcom, and there is nothing at all within the regulations that would stop ITV grouping the ad breaks into the section of the programme before the live race and the section after it.
More importantly, there are regulations that specifically forbid ITV from placing ad breaks within the live coverage of the race.
The problem is that ITV is flouting the rules, and Ofcom is turning a blind eye to it.
Rule 5.1 of Ofcom’s Rules On The Amount And Distribution of Advertising says:
Breaks within programmes may be taken only at a point where some interruption in continuity would, in any case, occur (even if there were no advertising) and such natural breaks must not damage the integrity or value of the programme in which they occur.
It is perfectly clear that putting ad breaks into live coverage of a Formula One race, which has no natural breaks, does damage the integrity or value of the programme. Therefore, ITV is in breach of that Ofcom rule.
Rule 6.7 Sport is even more specific:
(a) Breaks may be taken during intermissions of the particular sport being televised - for example half time, between races, between innings, etc.
(b) In live coverage of long continuous events breaks may be taken at points where the focus of coverage shifts from one point to another of the event for example after a resume of the current placings in a race and before refocusing on a particular section of the race. Breaks may also be taken adjacent to cut-away
discussion or background film insert sequences.
Part (a) doesn’t apply, as Formula One does not have intermissions, half-time, or breaks between races.
Part (b) doesn’t apply, either, as Formula One races are continuous and viewers want to see all of the action. There is simply no point at which the “focus of coverage shifts from one point to another”, etc.
But ITV has been acting as if there were such points and has been relying on this rule to justify spoiling the race for viewers by throwing in ads.
The only way ITV could have got away with it is if, under Rule 6.11, it had received its live race coverage from an overseas broadcaster that had left gaps in the coverage that could only be filled with ads. Or, as Ofcom puts it:
Where an Ofcom licensee relays a live programme feed from an overseas broadcaster, the break pattern of the originating broadcaster may be taken.
After a week of trying to extract an answer from the ITV Sport Press Office, I finally received an admission today (Thursday 14 March 07) that ITV receives uninterrupted coverage of the race – ie, it could show it without any ads, but chooses to put them in itself. This proves that ITV cannot rely on an exemption under Rule 6.11.
ITV provided me with a statement which said:
ITV finds itself in an ever competitive market place and securing the live rights to Formula 1 in the UK was a great success for us. This has ensured that fans can still freely watch the races, but in so doing we of course need to sell the airtime as this is the lifeblood of ITV.
TV regulation has always permitted the insertion of advertising breaks during coverage of long continuous sporting events and therefore the insertion of breaks within the live races has been acceptable in principle. Unfortunately a Grand Prix does not have natural breaks in the same way that football, rugby or boxing matches do, and it is inevitable that commercial breaks are taken during the race. However in order to ensure that no dramatic action is missed during the commercial breaks the live action is recorded and replayed when appropriate.
I can assure you that ITV exercises due diligence regarding the effects of the advertising shown during the live races and ITV’s Production team (North One Television for ITV Sport) will continue to take every care to ensure that none of the race action is missed.
This is what is known in the trade as a fob-off.
In the first paragraph, ITV says it needs to sell the airtime. Of course it does, but it doesn’t need to sell airtime in the middle of the race itself. The programme is about three hours long, and the race is only just over half that, so there is more than enough airtime that could be sold without affecting our enjoyment of the race.
In the second paragraph, TV regulation does not permit the insertion of ad breaks in the circumstances affecting Formula One, as we’ve seen above.
ITV claims that makes the insertion of breaks within live races “acceptable in principle”. Acceptable to whom?
Not to viewers, who often get up at crazy times in the early morning to watch live races purely because they are live and therefore anything could happen.
And not, I trust, to Ofcom, whose rules do not judge ads in the middle of live races to be acceptable.
Still in paragraph two, ITV says it is “inevitable” that commercial breaks are taken during the race.
No, it’s not inevitable. It’s a choice that ITV makes and which the regulations forbid it from making.
It is no comfort to be assured that the live action is recorded and replayed where appropriate. If we were happy just to see replays, we might as well stay in bed and watch the re-run in the afternoon. The whole point of watching a live race is to see everything that happens, as it happens.
The third paragraph might even be believed by anyone who happened to have been born yesterday.
How can the ITV Production Team “take every care to ensure that none of the race action is missed”? Are they clairvoyant, perhaps? Anything can happen in this split-second sport – and often does – so there is no way the production team could possibly predict when would be a suitable time to take an ad break during the race.
There is one way of solving the problem, if viewers around the world who don’t have to rely on ITV for their Formula One coverage don’t mind, that is.
Just as flags are waved on the circuit to indicate no overtaking is allowed after an accident, for instance, Formula One could introduce an Ad Flag. This could be waved all around the circuit the moment ITV decides to go for an ad break, and all the drivers would be banned from overtaking, pitting, crashing, suffering engine failure, or doing anything else remotely interesting that viewers would not wish to miss. Then, when ITV have finished earning their money from the commercials, the Ad Flag could be waved again and the race could continue in earnest.
But there is another way.
We, the fans, could complain in our millions to ITV and to Ofcom to persuade ITV to stop doing it, and Ofcom to make sure they stop doing it.
And we could also complain directly to the companies that buy advertising slots during the live race. They know what they are doing, apparently, yet they choose to buy an advert that spoils the very event we tuned in to watch.
It might not have occurred to them, but that is hardly the best way to ingratiate themselves with us, the viewers they hope to persuade to buy their products or services.
If we threaten to boycott any company that advertises during the race itself, they will soon change their behaviour.
We’re not asking much – just the chance to watch Formula One races without ads interrupting them – and the regulations are on our side.
HERE'S WHAT TO DO:
To complain to Ofcom, fill out the form on its site: http://ofcom.org.uk/complain/progs/specific/?itemid=286480 or ring it on 020 7981 3000.
If you feel that Ofcom is neglecting its duty to enforce the regulations, you might wish to tip off Ofcom’s chairman, Ed Richards, at Ed.Richards@ofcom.org.uk
To complain to ITV, you can ring the Duty Office on 0870 600 6766 (a national-rate rip-off number, I notice) or e-mail the office at dutyoffice@itv.com
There is a feedback form on the itv.com website at http://www.itv.com/page.asp?partid=1215
We could also complain to the sports editors of our local newspapers and radio stations, telling them about this campaign and urging ITV to do a U-turn.
If we make our views known in sufficient numbers, we will get this changed. And if we don’t, we have only ourselves to blame.
STOP PRESS!
Following the response to my earlier posts about ITV spoiling its F1 TV coverage by putting ad-breaks into the live race, I've started an online petition to the Prime Minister, asking him to urge Ofcom to enforce its regulations and end this unfair practice.
If anyone wishes to sign it, it's at http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/spoilsports/
If enough of us do sign it, it might make a difference.
Thank you.
Jon
Jon McKnight
Author of Sort The Bastards!
