Norwich City Council calls for ethical advertising policy

Image credit: Adfree Cities

On 29th June 2021, Norwich City Council unanimously voted to adopt a motion in support of an ethical advertising policy for the city. The motion was proposed by two Green Party councillors - Martin Schmierer and Jamie Osborne - and draws extensively on the work from campaigning organisations Adfree Cities and Adblock Norwich. As it stands right now, the motion does not have any legal weight but is an official commitment from the Council to put together a policy that restricts harmful advertising on both public health and environmental grounds. 

Mounting pressure on local authorities 

This motion comes at a time of increased public scrutiny over local authorities to legislate against harmful advertising. At the end of 2020, Amsterdam’s City Council voted to end fossil advertising and effectively became the world’s first city to do so. Shortly afterwards, Bristol City Council adopted an advertising and sponsorship policy including a ban on ads for junk food, gambling, payday loans and alcohol. However, it fell short of regulating against adverts fuelling the climate emergency. Liverpool is another local authority who stepped up to legislate on polluting adverts after the Council unanimously approved a motion for a low-carbon advertising policy - the first in the UK - in January 2021.

The organisation Adfree Cities together with its local branch Adblock Norwich were instrumental in bringing the motion to the table which was successfully proposed by two Green councillors. While it still remains to be seen exactly how Norwich Council decides to proceed with devising an ethical advertising policy - and what grounds it will cover -  there is reason to hope that Norwich will soon become one of the first local authorities in the UK to put a ban in place against adverts for environmentally-damaging products such as SUVs, airlines and fossil fuels. Check out our Toolkit for Local Policymakers on how your council can take action against polluting ads.  

A matter of duty of care and “right to the city”

Several arguments were raised in support of this motion. Green councillors Schmierer and Osborne called for the Council to honour its duty of care by putting the welfare of its citizens first by ending harmful advertising. The councillors also listed the historical precedents set at the local level since the Mayor of London banned ads for junk food on the Transport for London network as well as Bristol’s recent adoption of a new Advertising and Sponsorship Policy covering junk food, gambling and payday loans.

“Passing this motion would send a powerful message to big employers in this city and elsewhere that Norwich is an ethical city” - Councillor Martin Schmierer

The damaging impacts on public health from adverts for gambling, junk food and the most carbon-intensive products were all raised by several Norwich councillors as motivation for taking action.

Councillor Jamie Osborne also made a reference to Henri Lefebvre’s “Right to the City” when arguing that legislating against harmful advertising is essentially a question of who has the right to public space and how? Questions which were provocatively raised by recent actions from subvertiser activists in the city.

Photo: Norwich City Council

The motion covers the “paid promotion of activities or products that are potentially harmful to mental or physical health or the environment, such as junk food, gambling, alcohol or the most polluting forms of transport”. The motion specifically calls for the council planning policy not to install advertising boards near schools; to work with other partners on how to phase out harmful ads and to ask for the national government to put a ban on “unethical advertising”.

Before reporting back to the Council, the Cabinet committed to look at other examples of ethical advertising policies, what powers Norwich has to regulate as a “second tier authority” (ie. not a county council) as well as references from London and ‘unitary’ authorities.  

What next ?

As momentum is strongly building on local authorities to honour their commitment to act on the climate emergency, there is a great opportunity to push for legislation against the most harmful forms of advertising including air flights, SUVs and fossil fuels. 

At Badvertising we have put together a toolkit specifically designed for policymakers who want to introduce low carbon advertising policies. As well as a tool for activists who want to lobby their authority to act in this area. 

These proposals are likely to be met with discontent from the targeted companies and advertising agencies and therefore inevitably lead to some pushback from them. But strong public support for these measures should serve as a guarantee for local authorities that banning harmful ads is now more than ever the right thing to do.