The first rulings under Labour’s junk food ad ban are in. A Lidl Instagram post featuring croissants and cheese pretzels has been banned. An ad for German Doner Kebab featuring an “Inferno OG chicken kebab” and a “chicken doner burrito” has been cleared. So according to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), croissants are junk food, and ‘inferno‘ kebabs are not…
The ban works on two tests. If a product is classified as high in fat, salt or sugar under the government’s nutrient profiling model and falls within one of just 13 specified food categories, it’s getting taken down. Pastries and bakery items make the list, but kebabs and burritos don’t. An Iceland ad showing sweets was also banned, while a travel ad featuring a child grabbing a chocolate doughnut at an airport buffet was cleared… because it wasn’t technically advertising the doughnut itself. Make sense? No? Don’t think about it too much, no one in government has…
The ban blocks ads for unhealthy food on TV between 5.30am and 9pm and in paid online media at any time. All this is supposedly to ‘protect the children’. Who never watch terrestrial television anyway, and can find YouTube videos of blokes trying to eat the entire McDonald’s menu in one go with just a few clicks…
