A3

In this task I will be discussing the regulations of 5 different companies. I will be discussing the company, also I
will be evaluating how relevant for the pre-production of companies creating a form of film production. The
companies that I will be talking about are Ofcom, BBFC which are two regulations companies. Another one
that I will be looking at is ASA which is an advertising standards company. The next two are trade unions which
will include the two companies, BECTU and Pact.

The first one that I am going to use is Ofcom, which is a company that regulates the UKs broadcast regulator.
The quote that they use is to get across their ideas are “We regulate the TV, radio and video-on-demand
sectors, fixed-line telecoms, mobiles and postal services, plus the airwaves over which wireless devices
operate.” They are funded through fees from the industry regulating media content. They are in control of the
watershed time; the watershed time is between 9pm and 5:30am this is due to the average time that children
go to sleep. Before the watershed they are not allowed to show harm and offense, offensive language and
sexual behaviour. There are examples of when Ofcom have fined major companies such as the BBC. There is a
story on the telegraph newspaper, of the BBC radio encouraging people to phone in and try to win even
though they no chance of winning. This was found out in an investigation on the Jo Wiley Show and Russell
Brands. Ofcom found in this investigation that the BBC failed to have “adequate management oversight of its
compliance and training procedures to ensure that the audiences were not misled.” Another story when
Ofcom had the declared that Jeremy Clarkson from the BBC show “top gear” had used casual racism. Clarkson
using the word "slope", as an Asian man walked over a bridge in Burma. The scene led to a complaint of ''casual racism'',
with Clarkson accused of referring to "people of different races in pejorative terms.” The show had to apologies for its use
of offensive language. Below, there is a link that shows all of the closed cases that Ofcom have issued out.
https://www.ofcom.org.uk/home

https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ofcom

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2473574/BBC-fined-400000-by-Ofcom-for-deceiving-viewers.html

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/10810332/Ofcom-investigates-Top-Gear-after-complaint-of-casual-racism.html

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom/latest/bulletins/competition-bulletins/all-closed-cases

The next regulation business I will be looking at is BBFC which stands for British board of film classification.
“The British Board of Film Classification is an independent, non-governmental body which has classified
cinema films since it was set up in 1912.” The reason that they started is due to the video recording act. They
also work with YouTube and vivo to issue out the age rating of videos. There are seven different age ratings in
the UK that the BBFC rate. Examiners will look for indications din discrimination, drugs, horror, language,
imitable behaviour, nudity, sex sexual violence when decision making over an age range for the film. They are
funded through charged fees that production companies will have their film watched through and examined.
One example of a film that has been classified is “Batman: The Dark Knight” the film itself got an age rating of
12 due to its violence with the Joker holding a knife to a women’s face during the first scenes. Another film
that has been age restricted is “fight club” similar to the previous film. This film is rated 18 due to its violence
and usage of blood. Another reason why it was rated an 18 is because they were trying to glamorise violence
and drug usage. http://www.bbfc.co.uk/about-bbfc

https://www.bbfc.co.uk/case-studies/dark-knight

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/case-studies/fight-club
The next company is ASA which is an advertising company; this company is the UKs independent
advertisement regulator. The company have set rules that business must apply by to make an advert. They
respond to posts that are usually seen as a misleading, harmful, offensive or irresponsible. They are funded by
a voluntary levy. They only take 0.1% on the cost of buying advertising space. In some cases, adverts have been
taken down due to them not reaching the right requirements or guidelines that the advertising standards have
put out. The reason that they exist is to regulate adverts and make sure that they are not offensive to anyone.
This example below was the most responds for an advert in 2017 was the KFC chicken one. The advert was
taken down due to the comments of vegan views talking about animal slaughter. Another example is the
moneysupermarket.com advert. It got the second most complaints due
to some people finding it homophobic.

https://www.asa.org.uk/about-asa-and-cap/about-regulation/our-funding.html

The next company is BECTU which is also a Union that help. This company is the UK’s media and entertainment
trade union. What a union is a group of people that represent workers based in the UK who help the workers
in that industry get their rights. BECTU are funded through the workers paying them for joining the union. The
key aims of the union are to protect jobs, increase membership, new recognition agreements, and improved
pays. An example of when they have acted as a trade union is when they fought for the female pay to increase
to close the gender pay gap in media. They used a local casting to focus on the pay gap and media employees
having to find work in big cities such as London and Manchester to find work that pays enough; This lead to
the selling of Babcock Media, which shows the strength of the union itself helping others in need. They have
started to encourage transgender and other minorities to speak up about their troubles in which they are
facing. Some examples are being treated without equality, or the gender pay gap which is an increasing
problem in the media industry which is slowly getting solved with the help from BECTU.

https://www.bectu.org.uk/news/2877
The final company that I will be looking at is PACT. Pact is a trade association which has the interests of the
small media companies in all the sectors from television, newspaper to radio. They offer business and legal
advice to the small sectors. They were a big influence in the 2003 communication act which helps give
independence to UK producers and their property rights. This has had an impact on what films and adverts are
using music wise which was one of the biggest issues; as they were using other people’s music without
permission. They encourage smaller companies to take part in their markets in which they can sell their
content and help introduce themselves to the vast industry of media. Recently they have ensured an
agreement for viewing for the UK when we leave the EU. This allows us to obtain and send information to
other countries without needing a licence. Hopefully this will help the community communicate with the outer
Europe which will help small companies express their content to others.

http://www.pact.co.uk/about-us.html