Alcohol Concern advertising report dismissed as 'seriously flawed'

Alcohol Concern’s report, Stick to the Facts​​, calls for restrictions on the content of adverts. It suggests only allowing messages and images that refer to the characteristics of the product, meaning that the promotion of ‘lifestyle’ images of drinkers or scenes that glamorise drinking would be banned.

The report is also calling for a complete ban on alcohol advertising at sporting, cultural and music events. It’s a move already made in France where rugby’s Heineken cup is known as the H cup.

However, advertising membership body ISBA said the report reveals an “abject failure on their part to reflect the fact that the UK’s self-regulatory system is working and that fewer young people are drinking alcohol”.

Ian Twinn, ISBA’s director of public affairs, said: "Stick to the Facts​ is a seriously flawed work of fiction, but sadly is nothing we haven’t seen before. It is another attempt by an anti-alcohol lobbying group to impose further restrictions on an industry that is already subject to strict self-regulatory rules and is an industry with an extremely high rate of compliance."

He added: “The truth is that self-regulation is working. The UK features some of the toughest advertising rules in Europe with rules, already ban alcohol adverts during programmes where there is a likelihood of a high proportion of children tuning in.

"How does Alcohol Concern explain that underage drinking is declining in this country, where we have alcohol advertising, yet in France, where it has been banned, it is going up?"

Brand exposure​
Last month, Ofcom said it would ask advertising regulators to review the rules that limit alcohol brand exposure to children. According to its own research, children saw an average of 3.2 alcohol adverts a week in 2011, compared to 2.7 in 2007.

However, Twinn questioned why advertisers would want to waste money marketing to a demographic that can’t legally buy their product. “What the advertisers are doing is trying to influence adults, not young people, to drink their brand, and they do this sensibly and responsibly.”

Alcohol Concern’s five report recommendations are:

1. Messages and images in alcohol advertising should only refer to the characteristics of the product, such as strength, origin, composition and means of production.
2. The regulation of alcohol advertising and promotion should be statutory and independent of the alcohol and advertising industries. There needs to be a review of the way digital and online content is regulated.
3. The regulator must be equipped with the ability to levy meaningful sanctions, such as fines, for serious non-compliance. It should work in a more proactive way, not depending on complaints from the public before investigating possible transgressions of the code.
4. Alcohol sponsorship and branded merchandise should be banned at sporting, cultural or music events.
5. Alcohol advertising should be banned in the trailers of films with less than an 18 certificate shown at cinemas.