ACMA has ruled that Swan Television & Radio Broadcasters, part of the Nine Network, breached political advertising rules when broadcasting an ad for the Western Australian Labor Party.
According to the body, the ad failed to properly identify who had authorised it to the audience.
The ACMA investigation found that the ad was “was correct and present in the written form, but the speed at which it was spoken made the information unclear to the point of being unintelligible.”
B&T understands the ad was run on all the networks and was cleared by Clear Ads.
The chair of ACMA, Nerida O’Loughlin, has said that no one listening would be able to reasonably understand who had authorised the ad.
“Correctly tagging political ads ensures transparency and accountability and promotes informed voting at elections,” she explained.
“To be fully informed, it’s important that audiences can identify the source of political ads and on this occasion the information was not made clear enough. It’s no good including the information if people can’t understand it.”