ASA Adjudication on Ryanair Ltd

Ad

Four national press ads, for Ryanair, all of which invited readers to send a protest by e-mail to ministers at the Treasury.

a. The first ad was headlined "WELCOME TO BRITAIN THIS IS A STICK UP!" and showed a picture of Gordon Brown's head on a small cartoon cowboy's body. Text stated "'GREEDY GORDON' DOUBLES APD TO £10 ON 1ST FEB. UK TOURISTS WILL PAY £1 BILLION MORE IN TAXES. THESE TAXES DAMAGE BRITISH TOURISM".

b. A second ad showed a picture of Gordon Brown's head on a small cartoon robber's body; he was holding a bag with "£1BN SWAG BAG" written on it. The ad was headlined "THE GREAT PLANE ROBBER and text stated "GORDON BROWN HAS DOUBLED APD TAX ON PASSENGERS TO £10. HE CLAIMS THIS IS FOR THE ENVIRONMENT - THIS CLAIM IS RUBBISH. AVIATION ACCOUNTS FOR JUST 2% OF CO2 EMISSIONS. THIS YEAR GREEDY GORDON WILL NICK £1BN FROM PASSENGERS".

c. A third ad, which appeared in The Daily Telegraph and The Times, and featured the same text as ad (b), was headlined "GREEDY GORDON'S SHOCK CONFESSION!". It showed a picture of Gordon Brown shaking hands with the Pope; text in a speech bubble from Gordon Brown stated "THIS YEAR I'LL NICK £1BN FROM TOURISTS" and text in a speech bubble from the Pope stated "EVEN I CAN'T ABSOLVE YOU OF THAT SIN".

d. A fourth ad was headlined "GREEDY GORDON WINS OSCAR ... FOR BEST STICK UP" and showed a picture of Gordon Brown's head on a small cartoon body holding an Oscar. Text stated "BIG BUDGET MAKE BELIEVE AT THE TAXPAYER'S EXPENSE, £1BN AIR PASSENGER TAX DECEPTION USING THE FLIMSIEST OF PRETENCES, EXTRAORDINARY SPECIAL EFFECTS - £1BN JUST DISAPPEARS INTO GREEDY GORDON'S POCKETS, THOSE HOLIDAY MAKERS WERE REALLY FLEECED - NOT A PENNY SPENT ON THE ENVIRONMENT, AVIATION ACCOUNTS FOR JUST 2% OF CO2 EMISSIONS AND YET HE PULLED IT OFF - UNBELIEVEABLE!"

Issue

1. Two complainants challenged whether the claim "UK tourists will pay £1 billion more in taxes" in ad (a) was misleading and could be substantiated.

2. Thirty-four complainants, including AirportWatch, challenged whether the claim "Aviation accounts for just 2% of CO2 emissions" in ads (b), (c) and (d) was misleading, because they believed that figure referred only to global emissions and the UK figure was 5.5%.

3. Ten complainants objected that the use of an image of the Pope in ad (c) was offensive to Christians, particularly because it appeared on Ash Wednesday.

4. Two complainants challenged whether the claim "not a penny spent on the environment" in ad (d) was misleading and could be substantiated.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

Response

1.  Ryanair said £1 billion was a very conservative estimate and they believed the actual amount would be much higher.  They said the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) had confirmed that 140 million passengers departed from UK airports each year.  Because of the increase in APD, they said long-haul passengers now paid £40 Air Passenger Duty (APD) (business class £80) and short-haul passengers paid £10 (business class £20).  They said, therefore, the APD would generate over £1 billion in additional revenue per annum.

2. Ryanair said the Stern Review had stated that the entire aviation industry generated 1.6% of greenhouse gas emissions, while the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) recognised that aviation accounted for just 2% of CO2 emissions.  They said those reports were sufficient to substantiate the claim in the ad.  They said the only meaningful figure for the impact of aviation on global warming was a global figure; it was a global issue and man-made national boundaries were irrelevant.  They said they had not claimed that the figure quoted in the ad was a UK figure.  They pointed out that the UK domestic aviation emissions figure was much lower, at 0.4% (as quoted by Ian Pearson MP, Minister of State for Climate Change in response to a Parliamentary question in the House of Commons on 22 March 2007).  Ryanair said it was not correct to use total emissions including international flights to and from the UK (which were included in the 5.5% figure), because that led to double counting; Ian Pearson had also stated that "there was no internationally agreed way to allocate those emissions". Ryanair illustrated their point with the example of a Quantas flight from London flying over Australian territory on route to Sydney: they questioned whether the emissions from that flight would be counted as Australias or as the UKs.  They said that since there was no reliable emissions figure for the UK the only relevant claim for the UK audience was "aviation accounts for just 2% of CO2 emissions".  

Ryanair provided statements from the European Low Fares Airline Association (ELFAA) and the International Air Transport Association (IATA).  The ELFAA said it was difficult to see how passengers of low fares airlines, who were of such varied composition, would recognise or understand aviation emissions as a share of localised, end of route totals.  They said those passengers would not understand a reference to the global problem of emissions from a UK-centric standpoint; they would be much more familiar with the 1.6% figure, which was quoted in the Stern Review.  They said it would be meaningless and misleading to quote a proportion which, it was claimed, was true at one end of an air route only.  They said greenhouse gases were a global problem and the only way to address them was at a global level.  

IATA said the IPCC report on Climate Change had concluded that emissions of CO2 by aircraft were 0.14 Gt C/year in 1992, which was about 2% of total anthropogenic CO2 emissions in 1992.  They said the 2% figure was widely acknowledged to be a reliable estimate of the total contribution from aviation to global man-made CO2 emissions.  They said IATA and its member airlines had consistently used that figure in their submissions to government bodies, UN working groups and in its communications with the media.  

IATA said although the 2% overall figure was widely acknowledged, there was no such agreement about the assertion that aviations contribution to UK CO2 emissions was 5.5%.  They said the way in which the 5.5% figure had been calculated was arbitrary and confusing.  They said there was no agreed and common method for attributing international aviation emissions to states.  The UK Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) had so far failed to find an agreed method.  In addition, they said the 5.5% figure included emissions in the UK as well as emissions from international flights departing the UK, regardless of the nationality of the passengers or the airlines involved.  

IATA said the effect of CO2 in the atmosphere was well understood; its global warming effect was the same regardless of where or when it was emitted.  They said, therefore, that insisting that CO2 reductions in one part of the world or in one sector were more effective or necessary than somewhere else made no environmental sense.  They said it did make sense to deal with global figures because most flying took place above international waters rather than above states.  They said that the UK aviations contribution to CO2 emissions was therefore less relevant than aviations contribution to CO2 emissions in total.

3. Ryanair said the fact that they ran the ad in two national titles with a combined circulation of over one million copies and only ten complaints had been received, demonstrated that the majority of people had not been offended by ad (c).

The Times said they believed the ad was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence and they had received only one complaint about it.  They said the style of the ad was very similar to that used by Private Eye for its covers and they believed that the use of the Pope in the photograph was entirely incidental to the actual intent of the ad, which had nothing to do with either the Pope or the Christian religion.

The Telegraph said they were surprised by the complaints, because they had received no complaints direct about the ad.  They said they gave the ad careful consideration before accepting it but had believed it did not denigrate the Pope either explicitly or implicitly and their readers would see the humour and not be offended.  

4. Ryanair said the Government had not earmarked a single penny of the money raised through the APD for environmental projects.  They said they had written to the Chancellor twice to ask him if that money would be spent on the environment but they had not received a reply.  Furthermore, they said the absence of any commitment from the Government to dedicate the additional revenue it raised from doubling APD on the environment had led to numerous petitions, which had called on the Chancellor and the Prime Minister to dedicate that money to environmental causes.  They highlighted one petition on the Downing Street website as an example.  Finally they said the Financial Secretary to the Treasury had stated in a House of Commons Select Committee meeting that the APD was "not specifically a tax that [was] designed for environmental ends".  

Assessment

1. Not upheld

The ASA noted Ryanair's assertion that CAA figures stated that 140 million passengers departed from UK airports in 2006.  We noted, however, the CAA figure Ryanair seemed to be referring to related to passenger traffic at the main UK airports and would include non-UK citizens who were on the outward part of their journey and who would not have paid the APD.  We understood from the CAA that they did not publish specific figures on the number of UK citizens who had departed UK airports; their figures merely showed that 235 million passengers had either departed or arrived in the UK in 2006.  Nevertheless, we noted HM Revenue and Customs published monthly and annual figures for the amount of revenue received from the APD and that in 2006 the total revenue received was 952 million.  We also noted the amount of revenue received increased year on year.  We considered that because the APD had been doubled, those figures were sufficient to demonstrate that the additional revenue the Government would receive from the increase in the APD would amount to "£1 billion".  We concluded that the claim was unlikely to mislead.

On this point, we investigated ad (a) under CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation) and 7.1 (Truthfulness) but did not find it in breach.

2. Upheld

We noted Ryanair had based the claim on the 1.6% figure for global greenhouse gas emissions from aviation stated in the Stern Review and the 2% figure for global CO2 emissions stated in the IPCC report "Aviation and the Global Atmosphere".

We noted many of the complainants considered the 2% claim was misleading because the Chancellor's Pre-Budget report had stated "The aviation sector currently accounts for around 5.5 per cent of the UK's total carbon dioxide output".  We noted that figure, however, included international aviation for which there was no agreed method for attributing to specific countries and that international aviation emission figures were not included in the national totals reported to the IPCC as part of the Kyoto Protocol.  We nevertheless understood from the Treasury that they chose to report international aviation figures separately from the domestic emissions totals and that they had based the 5.5% figure on emissions from domestic flights and on international flights departing from the UK only.  

Although we noted the emissions figures relating to the UK specifically which included international aviation were not included in national reported totals to the IPCC, we considered that in the context of an ad specifically about a UK tax initiative, and which specifically referred to "UK tourists", readers could interpret the 2% figure as a reference to UK CO2 emissions, not global emissions.  We also considered that most readers would be likely to assume that the figure included both domestic and international flights from the UK.  

We noted there were many different figures available for aviations contribution to climate change, including global emissions or individual countries' emissions, as well as greenhouse gas emissions, CO2 emissions specifically or the overall impact of aviation emissions on climate change (for example figures that included the so-called multiplier effect of radiative forcing) and we therefore considered that, to avoid confusion, it was important that the basis of the figures quoted in an ad was made clear.

We considered that, because Ryanair had failed to make the basis of the 2% figure quoted in the ad sufficiently clear, it was likely to mislead.

On this point, ads (b), (c) and (d) breached CAP Code clause 7.1 (Truthfulness).

3. Not upheld

We noted several complainants were offended by the use of the Pope's image in ad (c), particularly because the ad had appeared on Ash Wednesday.  We considered, however, that readers were likely to interpret the ad as mocking Gordon Brown, rather than mocking or denigrating the Pope or the Catholic religion.  We considered that ad (c) was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence to readers of The Times or The Daily Telegraph.

On this point, we investigated ad (c) under CAP Code clause 5.1 (Decency) but did not find it in breach.

4. Upheld

We noted the statement by the Financial Secretary, which Ryanair had highlighted, related to the original intention of the APD, rather than a statement about how the revenue from the APD would be spent.  We also noted Baroness Hanham had asked the Government in the House of Lords where the revenues of the APD would be devoted and Lord Davies of Oldham, who had responded on behalf of the Government, stated that the Government intended to invest the resources available from the APD in environmental measures and in increasing public transport.

We considered that Ryanair had not provided sufficient evidence to prove that the Government had not spent or did not intend to spend any of the revenue from the APD on environmental causes.  We concluded that the claim was likely to mislead.

On this point, ad (d) breached CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation) and 7.1 (Truthfulness).

Action

We told Ryanair not to repeat the claims "Aviation accounts for just 2% of CO2 emissions" and "not a penny spent on the environment" in their ads.  We advised them to seek guidance from the CAP Copy Advice Team for their future ads.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)