The Farmers' Union of Wales today urged the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) to deal with complaints about the RSPCA's Metro newspaper anti-badger cull advert by following the precedent set in 2010 when the union’s complaint over campaign group Save the Badger’s use of the word “exterminate” was upheld.
The RSPCA's advert - claiming the English badger cull pilots will "exterminate" badgers - has prompted 80 complaints to the ASA and Defra minister Richard Benyon has described the society as a disgrace for running full page adverts, free of charge, in the Metro newspaper under the headline "Vaccinate or Exterminate?"
The advert adds: “The UK Government wants to shoot England’s badgers. We want to vaccinate them - and save their lives.” It asks the public to donate £3 to its campaign to "help save England’s badgers" and "stop the cull".
FUW bTB spokesman and vice president Brian Walters said: "Following the union's complaint regarding a similar advertisement, the ASA ruled in December 2010 that claims in newspaper advertisements placed by Save the Badger - a campaigning organisation run by Somerset-based charity Secret World Wildlife Rescue - were untrue and unsubstantiated.
“This included a complaint regarding the claim in the advert that badgers would be ‘exterminated’.”
The ASA concluded that the use of the word “exterminate” by Save the Badger was misleading and breached CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation), 7.1 (Truthfulness) and 8.1 (Matters of opinion).
Mr Walters added: "The RSPCA's advert is just the latest example of a campaigning group misleading the general public on the issue of badger culling, and the RSPCA has previously been found guilty of using untruthful and unsubstantiated adverts to oppose badger culling.”
Mr Walters was referring to the ASA’s ruling in September 2006 which upheld complaints against the RSPCA’s “Back Off Badgers” campaign by the FUW and a Mrs Hillary Seals. Following a lengthy inquiry, the ASA found the RSPCA had breached ASA Code clauses 3.1 and 3.2 (Substantiation) and 7.1 (Truthfulness).
“Despite this ruling, the RSPCA went on to make the same claims, albeit in a different wording, on their website for 12 months and in 2008 were still using consultation response figures in anti-badger cull lobbying activities which it knew to have been generated by its own untruthful and unsubstantiated campaign.
“The RSPCA have form regarding this issue, but seem to treat both the ASA and the Charity Commission - not to mention the general public - with utter contempt.”
Mr Walters said the FUW had already raised a number of serious concerns with the Charity Commission regarding the RSPCA’s campaigning activities and extreme rhetoric.
“This is just the latest example of a long list of disgraceful activities - including threats to farmers - undertaken by the RSPCA over the past decade.”