ACMA chair refuses to rule out suspending 2DayFM’s licence over royal prank call
ACMA chair Chris Chapman
The chairman of the broadcast watchdog has refused to rule out temporarily suspending the licence of 2DayFM as punishment for breaching its licence conditions over the royal prank call broadcast in 2012.
Yesterday Mumbrella revealed The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) is mulling taking the station off air for a few hours, after a ruling in the High Court on Wednesday that it did have the authority to make adjudications as to criminal guilt in determining a breach of law, allowing it to release a suppressed report which says the broadcaster broke NSW surveillance laws by broadcasting the prank call by two Today’s Hit Network DJs.
“The authority hasn’t made any decisions about what sanctions are appropriate,” ACMA chairman Chris Chapman told ABC Media Report. “In the first instance we will publish the full report and then we will give further considerations to what sanctions… we haven’t decided where to go from there.”
Several hours, ACMA??!!! You have to be joking. Several hours off air is not even a slap on the wrist.
Already the commercial interests are getting together to challenge the rules by which these findings were made, so if ACMA seriously wants the holders of commercial broadcast licenses to take any that’s ANY) notice of the regulations which control this industry, it needs to shake a big stick.
Again, I say: 2DAY’s misbehaviour resulted in a needless death, which was caused by foolishness which represented a clear disregard of the regulations. I’d suggest that several weeks, or several months off air would put the industry on notice, not to mention the impact of rescinding the license altogether. It is after all a LICENSE to broadcast, and therefore subject to conditions.
Now, that would be ACMA giving the industry something to reckon with.