Alcohol ad review body hits out at AANA's 'nonsense' claims

By By Alexandra Roach | 9 July 2012
 

The Alcohol Advertising Review Board has fired back at the Australian Association of Advertisers' arguments for the body to disband, calling the statements "absolute nonsense" and "ridiculous".

The AANA last week argued the AARB is ineffective as it has not handed down any determinations in the four months since its launch, despite committing to a target of 20 working days on average for the handling of complaints.

Ten determinations relating to alcohol advertising have been handed down by the AANA in the same timeframe.

But the AARB has dismissed the AANA's statements as “pure hype”.

“It's all absolute nonsense,” AARB spokesman Professor Mike Daube told AdNews. “We're going to be releasing a report about our first three months of determinations later in July. We've already said that we would put out a proper report and the AANA know that. They should just wait for us to do what we said we'd do and release the report.”

Daube told AdNews the AARB had the original intention of releasing determinations to the schedule of within 20 working days, but decided to release a quarterly report after the high number of complaints received.

“We weren't sure if we'd receive just a few complaints [when the AARB launched], but we've had over 70 so far. We thought it didn't make sense to put out comments on the first few determinations. There is no delay nor a hanging jury. This is an objective process.”

Daube said the results of all complaints received by the AARB will be released alongside the report later this month.

“Methinks the AANA doth protest too much,” Daube told AdNews. “I'm amused and fascinated by their interest in the AARB and we're doing. I hope they'll be as interested when we release the report.

“For the AANA to put out a media release of that kind [calling for the AARB to disband] tells me that you have an organisation that is quite rattled. I'm delighted by their interest in us and our work.”

Daube said the AARB is not an “action by activists”, as claimed by AANA chief executive Scott McClellan in March when the AARB launched.

“We're not out to ban alcohol advertising and that's never been our aim,” Daube said. “The idea is to moderate certain content. If we can achieve that, it will be beneficial.”

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