National cleared of complaints over ad
New Zealand’s advertising watchdog has cleared the National Party of several complaints against a social media ad attacking the Government’s ‘feebate’ scheme.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) ruled early last month against several complainants who said one of the ads were false and misleading.
The ad in question ran on Facebook and Twitter where parties from across the spectrum are currently pouring their ad dollars in the leadup to next year’s election.
National has run ads against the Government’s proposal to introduce a ‘‘feebate’’ and fuel efficiency standard for car imports.
This feebate would subsidise the cost of newly imported efficient and electric vehicles by adding penalties of up to $2000 on gas guzzling cars, including popular SUVS.
The standard would mandate that the average fuel efficiency of imported cars met a certain level, meaning companies importing gas guzzlers would have to import cleaner cars too, or face a stiff penalty.
National has branded the scheme ‘‘Labour’s car tax’’ and has run dozens of ads against it with a particular focus on the idea of regular New Zealanders having to subsidise often expensive electric vehicles.
The scheme caps off how expensive those vehicles can be at $80,000, but this still lets several higher-end models in.
One of the complaints referred to an ad on National MP Brett Hudson’s Facebook page which read ‘‘How’s this fair?
According to the Ministry of Transport, Labour’s Car Tax will slap a $1000 tax on someone buying a used imported Corolla in order to give a $1500 discount to someone who is buying an imported electric Porsche Cayenne.’’
The ad compared a 1990s Toyota Corolla, somewhat unlikely to be newly imported to New Zealand in the early 2020s, to a shining Porsche Cayenne.
As the Corolla would not meet fuel efficiency standards it would be hit by a fee on its first sale in New Zealand, and the Cayenne would receive a discount if bought for less than $80,000.
The complainant said the ad was ‘‘false and misleading’’ as the Porsche Cayenne would cost more than the $80,000 cap, but the National Party responded to say that the Porsche would be available as a used vehicle for less than $80,000 – and noted that the car itself was listed as receiving a discount in Ministry of Transport tables.
The complaints board of the ASA ruled that the ad qualified as an ‘‘advocacy’’ advertisement, meaning they give it a somewhat wider berth.
They also found that while the ad used ‘‘extreme examples in terms of the age and price of the cars for its comparison in order to make a political point’’ that point was substantiated and did not reach the threshhold of being misleading.
The other complaint referred to the same advertisement on Twitter, and the ASA came to a similar decision.
The ASA found against the National Party several months ago, when senior MP Gerry Brownlee was using misleading figures to promote National’s policy of indexing taxes to wage inflation.