Background

Post eviction from Celebrity Big Brother 2010, Vinnie Jones participated in a follow up show hosted by Davina McColl. In the broadcast he referred to McColl in a chicken outfit by saying she “walked like a retard”, McColl laughed & retorted, “I don’t walk like a retard.”.

On the other side of the TV screen, the mother of two autistic daughters, Nicky Clark, took offence and complained to Channel 4. She asked for a public apology from the station, which she never got. She complained to Ofcom, but was overruled as they didn’t believe the word was intended to offend. She then appealed against the ruling twice.

Mencap teamed up with Ms Clark to help her persuade Ofcom to reverse its decision and to raise awareness of the offensive nature of the word.

Strategy

Mencap asked Opinion Matters to conduct research into public opinion of the word ‘retard’. The research was conducted with 1,448 adults in the UK, all of which were asked if they were viewers of Channel 4. They were also asked whether they themselves used the word ‘retard’ and in what context, if any, they thought it would be acceptable. The results were cross-tabulated by age and location, providing Mencap with a variety of potential media opportunities locally as well as nationally.

Results

Results showed that only 1 in 10 Channel 4 viewers thought it was acceptable to use the word as a joke and 3 in 5 viewers found the word offensive.

The campaign was covered in print (The Mail on Sunday; The Daily Telegraph; The Independent and The Guardian and BBC websites) and also amassed TV coverage in the form of The Wright Stuff, BBC Radio Five Live and BBC One’s Jeremy Vine Show. As a response to the results, the regulator of Ofcom replied to say it was reviewing the decision not to uphold the complaint. The Broadcasting Review Committee also decided that Ofcom had been wrong in its decision to overrule and that Channel 4 had breached the broadcasting code.