Television House, Kingsway, London W.C.2
CHAncery 9861
Chairman 1962/63: Howard Thomas; Secretary: Laurence G Parker, MA, LL.B; Information Officer: Hugh M Matthews; Advertising Copy Executive: Bryan Rook.
Constitution
I.T.C.A. is the Trade Association of the Programme Companies which were appointed by the Independent Television Authority under the Television Act 1954, and all fifteen Companies so appointed are members. The Association is incorporated as a Company Limited by Guarantee and is financed by subscriptions from the member Companies.
Committee Structure
The affairs of the Association are governed by the Executive Council which, in practice, delegates all matters of a routine nature to the Finance and General Purposes Committee. The wide and growing interests of the Association are indicated by the following list of other Committees: (a) Advertising Committee, (b) Advertising Copy Committee, (c) Agency Recognition Committee, (d) Children’s Programme Committee, (e) Overseas Committee, (f) Public Relations Committee, (g) Research Committee, (h) Rights Committee, (i) Technical Committee.
Secretarial services are also provided for two further Committees of the Companies which are not, however, I.T.C.A. Committees. These are the Committee of Review of Grants to the Arts and Sciences and the Labour Relations Committee.
Scope and Functions
The Association is a voluntary, non-profit-making organisation which does not take part in any form of trading – either on its own account or on behalf of its members. It provides a forum for discussion and a channel for joint action over a wide range of subjects of common interest and concern to the Programme Companies. These subjects include the maintenance of high general standards in the industry, consultation and advice on legal and technical matters, negotiations with royalty collecting bodies representing authors, composers and publishers, and relations with an representation on other organisations, both in this country and overseas; for example, the Association, jointly with the I.T.A., is a full active member of the European Broadcasting Union.
Any matters directly concerning the business dealings of individual Companies are, however, specifically excluded and the Association does not discuss or in any way deal with, for example, programme networking arrangements or advertisement rates. Nor does the Association as such deal directly with labour relations. There is a Labour Relations Committee, composed of representatives of the Companies and with its own full-time Labour Relations Adviser, which negotiates with the various Trade Unions representing staff, performers and writers but, while it is serviced secretarially by the Association, this is not an Association Committee and all Labour Agreements are concluded direct between the Trade Unions and the individual Companies themselves.
Advertisement Copy Control
One of the activities of I.T.C.A. which should be specially mentioned is the work of the Advertisement Copy Committee, whose responsibility it is to ensure that all television advertisements conform to the Independent Television Authority’s “Principles for Television Advertising” and to the other codes of standards and rules governing advertising generally. For this purpose, the Association operates, on behalf of all Programme Companies, a central “clearing house” to which advertisers submit scripts and completed advertisements for approval before they are transmitted. This is a major task, involving the careful scrutiny of some 6,000 advertisements a year.
Information Office
The most recent addition to the activities of I.T.C.A. is a central information office designed to be a source of quick and accurate factual information on Independent Television for the National and Provincial Press. It will also be used by the current Chairman of I.T.C.A. for the issue to the Press of authoritative statements concerning the industry.