The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council is an independent, non-governmental organization created by the Canadian Association of Broadcasters to administer standards established by its members, Canada's private broadcasters.
The Council's membership includes more than 730 private sector radio and television stations, specialty services and networks from across Canada, programming in English, French and third languages. As such, the Council allows the private broadcasting industry to be self-regulating; it acts as an intermediary in the regulatory process, which is governed by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC). The CRTC itself generally hears complaints against only the few CBSC non-members (most notably public broadcasters such as the CBC), as well as reviews of CBSC decisions; the latter rarely lead to any additional action.
Although first suggested by private broadcasters as early as 1968, the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council was not created until 1990.
Contents |
The Council has five primary objectives:
Citations have been issued not only for violations of the content guidelines themselves but also for failing to provide sufficient information to viewers, i.e. missing or inadequate viewer advisories, or missing ratings icons.
In January 2011 the Council’s Atlantic Regional Panel ruled against CHOZ-FM[1] re the playing of the song “Money for Nothing” written by Mark Knopfler and Sting as recorded in 1985 by Dire Straits (CBSC Decision 09/10-0818).[2] The council ruled that Canadian radio stations must mute or otherwise edit out the word "faggot" before airing the original version of the song. The CRTC has asked the council to review their ban after they received numerous complaints about the ban.[3][4]