Product placement will be allowed on British television for the first time under legislation. Immediately after this development, the government’s plan to relax the rules governing product placement on TV has also been scaled back to some extent.
TV producers will not be allowed to use any branded alcohol, junk food or gambling when making programmes. The climbdown comes after the health secretary, Andy Burnham, and the environment secretary, Hilary Benn, lobbied against aspects of proposals backed by the culture secretary, Ben Bradshaw, to allow product placement on TV for the first time.
A report filed by The Guardian highlighted that commercial broadcasters had estimated that the visible positioning of products in TV soaps, dramas and comedy shows could bring in as much as £140m a year. It is unclear how much less income will now be generated, the report added.
It also emerged that broadcasters will soon be able to accept payment for featuring branded goods in their programmes for the first time in the UK. However, the government will ban paid inclusion of alcoholic drinks, foods that have high levels of fat, salt or sugar (HFSS), over-the-counter medicines, baby milk, gambling and smoking.
