Ottawa, June 4, 1999 – The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) today released its decision concerning a report on a company’s unsuccessful efforts to produce a visitors’ guide broadcast as part of CFTM-TV (TVA)’s public affairs program, J.E. The President of the failed business complained that the report was unfair and misleading.
The Quebec Regional Council considered thel complaint under the Codes of Ethics of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters (CAB) and the Radio Television News Directors Association (RTNDA). While the Council found that the report was structured so as to be fair and balanced, found that a “gross miscalculation on the reporter’s part created inherent unfairness in the report.”
The reporter attempted to calculate “a conservative estimate” of the amount of money Pendragon could have collected from local small businesses in its failed attempt to publish a visitor’s guide. He stated (and the numbers were put up on the screen) that, if 180 clients each paid the minimum of $200, Pendragon should have collected $360,000. While the Council understands that the addition of the extra zero (making the relatively small sum of $36,000 the rather huge sum of $360,000) may have been inadvertent, it was a reckless error on a centrally material issue in the report. Moreover, the error was compounded by the reporter who relied on the exaggerated number as the basis for his questioning of Pendragon’s president.
The Council further noted that “this gross mathematical error is not the only source of confusion in the report.” Overall, it considered that “the inexplicable sloppiness surrounding the information relating to potential revenues collected by [the company] created an unfair report.”
It appears to the Quebec Regional Council in this case that ... the reporter attempted to make his story more provocative than could ever have been supported by the facts. The Council considers that the error was so gross that the correct amounts at issue, if accurately calculated (at one-tenth of the figure actually used), may not even have given rise to the story at all.
Canada’s private broadcasters have created industry standards in the form of Codes on ethics, gender portrayal and television violence by which they expect their members will abide. They also created the CBSC, which is the self-regulatory body with the responsibility of administering those Codes, as well as the Code dealing with journalistic practices created by the Radio Television News Directors Association Canada (RTNDA). More than 430 radio and television stations and specialty services from across Canada are members of the Council.
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All CBSC decisions, Codes, links to members’ and other web sites, and related information are available on the World Wide Web at www.cbsc.ca. For more information, please contact the National Chair of the CBSC, Ron Cohen, at (###) ###-####.