Most people find swearing on TV offensive, claims media watchdog

A new poll published by Mediawatch-UK has found that most people find swearing on TV offensive.

The poll comes just days after reports of a survey by the BBC which found most people to be relaxed about bad language on air.

The Mediawatch-UK poll of more than 1,000 adults found that some 73 per cent find swearing on TV offensive, while 70 per cent believe broadcasting regulator OFCOM should do more to reduce the amount of swearing on TV.

Sixty per cent of people believe that swearing on TV encourages swearing in daily life and 53 per cent believe that children are not effectively protected from swearing on TV.

Mediawatch-UK chided the regulator for failing to uphold public complaints on the issue in spite of its own market research indicating that the majority of people believe there is too much swearing on TV.

John Beyer, director of Mediawatch-UK, said: “The results of this survey show once again that swearing on TV causes widespread offence and that OFCOM really is not doing enough to allay public concern.

"We certainly welcome OFCOM’s recent criticism of record-breaking programme, Ramsay’s Great British Nightmare, but this action is too little too late.”

The results were released on the same day as the close of Mediawatch-UK's online petition to the Prime Minister on swearing, which accumulated more than 5,400 signatures in six months.

"We are hopeful that Gordon Brown, who has expressed personal concern about broadcasting standards, will now directly intervene in this situation and call upon broadcasters and film makers to seriously improve standards of literacy in their media productions," Mr Beyer.

He called into question the findings of a survey of 7,000 adults by the BBC, which found that most viewers were relaxed about the use of bad language on air in certain contexts and particularly where broadcast after the 9pm watershed.

The BBC carried out survey after public outcry over a vulgar message left by presenters Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross on the voicemail of actor Andrew Sachs. Ross was suspended while Brand resigned over the prank.

Mr Beyer said the BBC’s latest findings seemed to contradict research it carried out earlier in the year for Panorama, which found that 55 per cent of people thought there was too much swearing on TV.

“It may be true that swearing ‘in context’ is tolerable but for most people the main concern is with swearing that is entirely gratuitous and has no dramatic or any other context whatsoever,” he said.

“Rather than wasting licence fee payers money on unnecessary surveys, the BBC should be asking itself how swearing in programmes fulfils its Charter obligation to ‘sustain citizenship and civil society’.”

Mr Beyer urged broadcasters to implement tighter controls on bad language.

“Otherwise they know they risk alienating swathes of viewers,” he warned. “In the digital age when broadcasting standards matter more and more to viewers and listeners it really is no good ignoring public feeling against swearing on TV.”