Ubi: No discrimination against VgT by Swiss television

VgT claimed that SF had been censoring it for more than ten years for political-ideological reasons. For example, it had not reported on three decisions of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in which Switzerland had been condemned. The background was an unbroadcast commercial by the VgT against cruelty to animals in farm animal husbandry. The ECtHR considered the ban on broadcasting the commercial to be incompatible with freedom of expression, which led to several condemnations of Switzerland.

Ubi initially did not respond to the two submissions of VgT because it did not consider the requirements for appeal to be met. The appeals filed against this The Federal Supreme Court ruled that thet. It found that discrimination against VgT by Swiss Television could not be ruled out and therefore instructed Ubi to comprehensively examine the content of the submissions as access complaints. 

No disadvantage - three contributions aired

SF had not discriminated against VgT or otherwise unlawfully denied it access to the editorial part of the program, the Ubi ruled. The appeals were rejected by 8:0 and 7:1 votes respectively. According to the Ubi, discrimination would exist if Swiss television had excluded the VgT from coverage exclusively for political-ideological motives and without factual reasons. However, the audit revealed that SF broadcast three German-language features related to the VgT during the relevant period (1998 to July 2009). Namely, it also showed a short feature on the first and landmark decision of the ECtHR in the main edition of the news program "Tagesschau".

In comparison with other Swiss animal protection organizations, the VgT was not obviously disadvantaged in the program, writes the Ubi in a media release. SF mentioned a few animal protection organizations active in Switzerland in the period in question about as much as the VgT, others not at all. Only the Swiss Animal Protection STS was reported far more than the VgT, especially due to its political work (e.g. popular initiatives).

Freedom in the choice of topics

In addition to the competitive situation among animal protection organizations, there are other factual reasons for the relatively small number of reports about the VgT in the program. One reason is the limited broadcasting time, which requires a considerable selection of topics. The changing relevance of the activities of organizations for media reporting and the program autonomy of the broadcasters, which includes freedom in the choice of topics, must also be taken into account.

The Ubi could not prove any tacit instruction to boycott the VgT. Somewhat unfortunate statements made by a former editor-in-chief about the president of the VgT could not be interpreted as instructions of a discriminatory nature when viewed in context, Ubi continued. The Ubi's decisions can be appealed to the Federal Supreme Court.

TSR broadcast reprimanded

However, Ubi considers a broadcast by the French-speaking part of Switzerland television to be "one-sided and tendentious". In the TSR report, accusations were made against the president of the VgT. This gave the impression that he had once again made defamatory statements against the Fribourg State Councilor Pascal Corminboeuf in a publication. However, the president of the VgT had not been given the opportunity to comment, although he had declared himself willing to do so in principle. The e-mail correspondence between him and the editorial staff in the run-up to the broadcast was summarized incompletely and tendentiously in the report. The Ubi approved the complaint with 6:2 votes. The decision can be appealed to the Federal Court in public law matters.