Court dismisses Bell’s appeal of Super Bowl ad swap proposal
The Federal Court has dismissed a BCE Inc. appeal of an order by Canada’s broadcast regulator seeking to end the practice of swapping American commercials for Canadian ones during the Super Bowl.
In an order issued Friday, Justice Yves de Montigny said he was dismissing the appeal “on the basis of it being premature.”
Bell filed the appeal after the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission announced its intent to put an end to the ad-swapping practice known as simultaneous substitution in January 2015, but before the regulator issued a formal order on Aug. 19 of this year.
“The result of the consultation should not be prejudged, and the administrative process should follow its course before the Court is called upon to adjudicate,” de Montigny said in the decision.
Bell-owned television stations CTV and RDS have the exclusive Canadian rights to the Super Bowl, which is consistently the highestrated TV event of the year.
The company had argued it didn’t have time to wait for the official order because it generally starts selling Canadian advertisements for the Super Bowl well in advance.
In an emailed statement, Bell spokesman Mark Langton said the company would file a new appeal as soon as possible now that the CRTC has issued an official order.
A spokeswoman for the CRTC did not respond to a request for comment by deadline.
In the decision, de Montigny said the CRTC should give Bell plenty of time to file an appeal before the 2017 Super Bowl.
However, he also found there was “no breach of procedural fairness by the commission.”
When he announced the simsub ban in January 2015, CRTC chairman Jean-Pierre Blais said he was responding to complaints from Canadian viewers who want to see the big-budget, hotly anticipated U.S. advertisements that run during the Super Bowl.
Many companies spend millions to showcase new ads produced specifically to run during the U.S. broadcast of the Super Bowl to take advantage of the game’s massive audience, which Canadians can’t see live because of simultaneous substitution.