Fox News breached UK’s broadcasting rules on day of Brexit vote

Report accused pro-EU side of “brainwashing”—claimed BBC was a “running ad for Remain.”

Kelly Fiveash – Aug 22, 2016 3:06 pm | 17

Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News violated the UK’s strict broadcasting rules by airing pro-Brexit commentary on the day of the EU referendum, Ofcom has ruled.

The British communications watchdog heard from a complainant who successfully challenged the US broadcaster’s Your World with Neil Cavuto programme, which discussed at length the UK’s membership of the European Union while the polls were still open.

Fox News’ show was simultaneously broadcast on June 23 in the US and UK, where it was aired on Sky News at 9pm that day—an hour before the EU referendum polls were set to close.

Ofcom has stringent impartiality rules on coverage of elections and referendums in the UK. Its broadcasting code guidance notes state the following under section six of those measures:

6.4 Discussion and analysis of election and referendum issues must finish when the poll opens. (This refers to the opening of actual polling stations. This rule does not apply to any poll conducted entirely by post.)

6.5 Broadcasters may not publish the results of any opinion poll on polling day itself until the election or referendum poll closes. (For European Parliamentary elections, this applies until all polls throughout the European Union have closed.)

6.6 Candidates in UK elections, and representatives of permitted participants in UK referendums, must not act as news presenters, interviewers, or presenters of any type of programme during the election period.

6.7 Appearances by candidates (in UK elections) or representatives (of permitted participants in UK referendums) in non-political programmes that were planned or scheduled before the election or referendum period may continue, but no new appearances should be arranged and broadcast during the period.

Fox News, which holds an Ofcom licence under Fox News Network Limited, ran a five-minute-long news item in which the broadcaster not only reported on the EU referendum, but editorialised it with a pro-Brexit stance.

At one point, the programme described the EU as “the European super state which makes many decisions on the behalf of the UK.” Later in the same item, Fox News carried the following statement:

I mean we are governed by a bunch of bureaucrats that don’t speak English in a funny place called The Hague, which makes no sense at all, and it tells Britain what to do, it takes British money, it doesn’t send much of if it back—it’s a very unfair one-way street when you begin to dig into it and the biggest thing of course is that all of this is all a disguise over the immigration issue.

Just 10 minutes before the polls closed, the programme accused the BBC of being “like a running ad” for the UK to stay in the EU and said that the Remain camp, including then-prime minister David Cameron, was “putting a lot of pressure on the public and there is a lot of propaganda out there and usually that type of brainwashing does work.”

FNN, when challenged by Ofcom, defended its programme by telling the watchdog that it had been prepared for a US audience. It also claimed that the show was unlikely to have influenced the decision of voters, given that it aired an hour before the polls closed.

Ofcom disagreed. It said (PDF) on Monday that Fox News had breached rule 6.4 of its broadcasting code.

“We… considered that the programme clearly contained a number of statements… which constituted discussion and analysis of referendum issues while the polls were still open.”

The watchdog added: “We also had regard to the fact that the prohibition in Rule 6.4 on discussion and analysis of referendum issues while the polls are open is not qualified in any way—for example, by the possibility of a broadcaster justifying the material by the context.”

When a broadcaster is found to have “deliberately, seriously, recklessly, or repeatedly” breached Ofcom’s code, the regulator may impose statutory sanctions, such as a fine. In more serious cases, Ofcom may consider stripping a broadcaster of its licence.