The National Court has endorsed a fine of 100,000 euros to Radio Televisión Española (RTVE) for broadcasting advertising messages contrary to the law during two matches of the Spanish soccer team in 2019, according to a ruling dated January 27 to which EL PERIÓDICO DE ESPAÑA, from the Iberian press group.
The offenses occurred in matches Spain-Norway, from March 23, 2019, and Malta-Spain, from March 26, 2019corresponding to the classification for the men’s Eurocup of the year 2020, finally played in 2021 due to the pandemic.
These matches were broadcast by La1, under the contract for the acquisition of television rights for Spain, signed between RTVE and UEFA, of the matches of the team then directed by Luis Enrique Martínez.
Over the course of both matches, RTVE aired 40 advertising overlays for various sponsors of UEFA and the Spanish team: Seat, Caixabank, Bet365, Pelayo, Booking.com, Danone and Domino’s Pizza.
The fine of the CNMC
For this reason, on December 11, 2019, the National Commission for Markets and Competition (CNMC) imposed a penalty of 100,000 euros on RTVE for a “continued administrative offense of a minor nature”since it “failed to comply with the prohibition of issuing audiovisual commercial communications”, under the financing model of the entity that has been in force since 2010.
RTVE appealed this sanction to the courts since defended that these advertising insertions were required by the conditions set by UEFA for the acquisition of the broadcasting rights of the matches. The law, in fact, recognizes this casuistry as an exception to the general rule of not broadcasting publicity on public television.
The sentence, in fact, cites article 7.1 of the RTVE Financing Law, which states that, “exceptionally, sports competitions may be broadcast with a sponsorship contract or other commercial forms when they form an indivisible part of the acquisition of rights and the production of the signal to be broadcast”.
UEFA does not oblige
The National Court has determined that these assumptions did not apply to this case, since UEFA in no case forced RTVE to carry out these advertising insertions during the broadcast of the matchesvalidating at that point the arguments that led the CNMC to sanction the public entity.
The ruling refers to the fact that UEFA includes in the contract “business opportunities” and that it imposes a series of guidelines for the uniformity of its broadcast in all countries, but that in no case are the rights holders obliged to carry out the advertising insertions for which RTVE has now been sanctioned.
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It does do so in the matches of the final phase of the League of Nations, in which the signal is uniform and indivisible for all the operators, but in the rest of the matches (such as those that led to the sanction) it is at the discretion of each one. from them.
“There is no error in the interpretation of the contract [por parte de la CNMC] Since it does not deduce more than the obligation to submit to UEFA’s publicity through the rules and requirements that it imposes, but notor requires that this advertising necessarily and indissolubly be framed within the sports broadcastespecially when these organizations such as UEFA are aware of the public service mission of this CRTVE that does not have any commercial mission ”, remarks the ruling, before which an appeal is possible.