ABSTRACT
Besides this substantial body of legal rules, in recent years significant attempts have been made at the self-regulation of the advertising industry. Thus, the broadcasting of advertisements is strictly controlled by the IBA Code of Practice, whilst other forms of advertisement fall within the purview of the ASA (see ante, para 3.14). The OFT (see generally ante, para 3.03) has also been active in promoting voluntary codes of practice, eg, mail order advertisements (see ante, para 3.11 et seq), recognising that what is needed is a judicious mixture of legal controls2 and self-regulation;3 and the OFT’s representatives on the ground are the trading standards officers of the local authority (see ante, para 3.05). Some such codes are easier to police than others, as where the code is produced by the advertising medium4 or approved by it.5 To the foregoing may be added the effect of numerous EU-generated rules, such as that relating to public procurement,6 data protection (see ante, paras 3.26-28) and misleading advertisements. There seems to be little general legal control as regards the misleading packaging, as opposed to labelling, of goods.7
