Grade: Junk food ad restrictions 'patronising'

Michael Grade, executive chairman of ITV, this morning hit out at Ofcom's decision to regulate the advertising of junk food around TV programmes aimed at children, calling the move "patronising to viewers."

Speaking at the Voice of the Listener and Viewer's spring conference, he said he felt the regulations had just been put in place as the government "must be seen to be doing something" about the problem of obesity in young people.

"I am not against regulation, " he said, "but it is as if Ofcom has gone 'Let's impose some regulations," and compared it to Margaret Thatcher's 1980s broadcasting ban on politicians in Northern Ireland believed to be supporting terrorism.

Grade said the connection between junk food ads and childhood obesity was "simplistic" adding, "Life is more complicated than that."