Talks reopen on Greek toy advert ban

Date: 13/06/1996

By Fiona McHugh

THE European Commission will next week consider once again whether to take Greece to court for imposing an allegedly illegal national ban on advertisements for toys.

But with several Commissioners opposed to court action, Athens is unlikely to find itself in the dock in the near future.

Internal Market Commissioner Mario Monti, supported by a number of liberal colleagues, believes the Greek measure breaks up the single market and should be scrapped.

Prompted by complaints from toy-makers and advertisers, he proposed starting legal proceedings as early as last year, but has so far failed to muster the necessary support within the Commission.

Greece insists its ban is needed to protect under-age consumers. Opponents counter that if the Greek government is so concerned about ethics, why does it allow children's programmes to be interrupted by advertisements for alcohol, tobacco and sweet snacks?

According to international companies such as Lego, the ban on toy advertisements before

10 pm was introduced to protect domestic toy manufacturers from outside competition.

Before it was introduced in 1994, they say, Greek toy-makers, unable to afford increasingly expensive television space, were losing out to their international rivals. Since the ban, their fortunes have been reversed.

Earlier this year, the Commission adopted a Green Paper on commercial communications in which it promised to weed out advertising measures which acted as barriers to cross-border trade.

Greece is not the only country in the 15-member bloc to have imposed bans on toy advertising. Sweden, Belgium and Ireland have similar laws. Toy-makers claim that minors suffer indirectly from such bans, because the resulting lack of advertising revenue dries up funds for investment in children's programmes.