Robinson’s Sponsorship ‘compromised’ BBC

The BBC Trust has ruled that the broadcaster ‘compromised its integrity’ by signing a sponsorship deal with Robinson’s for the Sports Personality of the Year programme and has banned future sponsorship of such events.

Editorial guidelines were breached by the deal with Britvic, whose Robinson’s brand was mentioned during December’s programme, the watchdog said.

The BBC said it would not renew the Sports Personality agreement or other sponsorship deals when they expired with the Robinson’s contract having one final year to run.

Given it is funded by licence payers, the BBC is not allowed to take sponsorship of broadcast programmes but the Robinson’s deal was done under the guise of it being sponsorship of a live event as opposed to a programme.

ITV and RadioCentre, which represents commercial radio broadcasters, both lodged complaints however these were not upheld by BBC management so both companies appealed to the Trust.

Last year’s Sports Personality of the Year was watched by 6.9m people with boxer Joe Calazghe winning the prize.

‘UK audiences expect to receive BBC programmes that are free of advertising and wholly impartial,’ the trust said in a statement.

‘Anything that creates an impression that a programme may be sponsored is wrong and contrary to the BBC’s editorial guidelines.’

The BBC responded in a statement: ‘In the context of today’s findings, the management of the BBC has reviewed its sponsorship policy and has concluded that it should no longer accept sponsorship from commercial bodies for any on-air BBC event.

‘This conclusion will be reflected in our revised guidelines which will be put to the BBC Trust in October for approval.’
 
The BBC said it earned around £1.5m each year from deals including Sports Personality of the Year, Proms in the Park, the Radio 3 New Generation Artists Scheme and the BBC Four World Cinema Award.