RTE Found to Have Infringed Rules on Fairness in Election Coverage

The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland has upheld a complaint from Cllr. Bríd Smith (People Before Profit Alliance) and Paul Murphy MEP (Socialist Party) about RTE reporting of poll evidence on the Euro elections.

Commenting today Bríd Smith said: “RTE is under an obligation to behave in an impartial way during the coverage of elections. But they have acted in a disgraceful way throughout this campaign. Both Paul and myself have been vindicated in a recent complaint we made about how the station suppressed news of a dramatic rise in support for both our candidacies. We believe that this arises from a systemic bias which assumes that non-mainstream parties must be marginalised and not treated seriously.”

The BAI judgement is as follows:

‘Accordingly, in excluding the poll results in respect of the above candidates (Bríd Smith and Pail Murphy), the broadcast was found to infringe the requirement for fairness in current affairs (including that element of Rule 4,1 of the BAI Code of Fairness, Objectivity and impartiality in News and Current Affairs pertaining to fairness in current affairs). The broadcast was also found, in respect of coverage of these two candidates, to infringe Rule 27 of this Code (requirement to comply with the BAl Guidelines in Respect of Coverage of Local and European Elections).’

Commenting further Cllr. Smith said: “We call on RTE to broadcast this judgement immediately so that the public are informed of its content. We also call on them to cease their attempt to marginalise left wing parties and resume their role an impartial public broadcasting service.”

The full text of BAI ruling is available here: BAI Smith Murphy