BSA Releases 6 Decisions
The Authority has not upheld two complaints about a 1News item on the Government’s rejection of an application to officially change the name of Russell to the town’s original name, Kororāreka.
The complaints alleged an interviewee’s comment that those against the name change were ‘usually older…always white’ was racist, ageist, and of ‘questionable’ accuracy, and that it was unbalanced, biased and unfair to include only interviews with supporters of the name change. The BSA found the comment was opinion and didn’t reach the threshold for denigrating a section of the community; the broadcast was framed as being from the perspective of community members disappointed by the decision. It was sufficient under the balance standard to acknowledge the existence of the alternative perspective through comments from the Minister of Land Information about his decision not to change the name. The issue has been the subject of other coverage, meaning the likelihood of any real harm or the audience being left uninformed was reduced, and did not outweigh the broadcaster’s freedom of expression
This and other recent decisions can be seen here.