Misleading and biased: UBI upholds complaint against Radio SRF
The Independent Complaints Authority for Radio and Television (UBI) has approved a complaint against a report on the Energy Act broadcast by Radio SRF's "HeuteMorgen" program.
The UBI dealt with complaints regarding two broadcasts in the run-up to the federal referendum of May 21, 2017 on the Energy Act. Such broadcasts are subject to heightened journalistic due diligence in order to ensure equal opportunities for the opposing camps. An approximately two-and-a-half-minute report of the information program "HeuteMorgen" of Radio SRF on May 2, 2017, on the costs of the Energy Act did not meet these requirements. In particular, a statement by the editor that the SVP was "certainly not right" with its cost calculations was misleading and biased, according to the UBI. The UBI therefore approved the SVP's complaint by six votes to three.
Second complaint is clearly rejected
On the other hand, the UBI rejected the complaint of a representative of the "Environmental Committee against the Energy Act" against the "Voting Arena" of Fernsehen SRF of April 28, 2017 on the "Energy Strategy" by eight votes to one. The UBI came to the conclusion that environmental aspects were underweighted in the discussion compared to other aspects. However, since the most important environmental issues were at least mentioned and neither camp was disadvantaged by this underweighting, the UBI considered this deficiency to be a minor point. Accordingly, the fact that the editorial team had not invited a representative of the "Environmental Committee against Energy Law" to the "Voting Arena" did not constitute discrimination and thus also an unlawful denial of access to the program.
The decisions of the UBI may be appealed to the Federal Supreme Court within 30 days after the written reasons for the decision have been submitted.
The UBI is an extra-parliamentary federal commission chaired by Vincent Augustin, a lawyer from Chur, and consisting of nine members. Its task is to determine on complaint whether radio and television broadcasts by Swiss broadcasters or publications from the SRG's other journalistic offerings have violated provisions on the content of editorial broadcasts or whether there has been an unlawful refusal of access to the program or to a publication. The UBI is preceded by ombudsmen, who act as mediators. (pd/hae)
