The BBC must pay an unprecedented £50,000 fine over the Blue Peter phone-in scandal in which a young studio guest posed as a competition winner.

Ofcom imposed the first financial penalty levied against the corporation after finding the BBC guilty of deceiving viewers and breaching a bond of trust with children.

But the BBC vigorously contested the fine, which sets a precedent and could undermine the corporation’s fiercely guarded tradition of self-governance.

The scandal erupted when the telephone system failed during a phone-in competition. A panicked researcher plucked a child from the Blue Peter studio and fed her the correct answer. She was put on air from a studio phone and named as the winner of the competition.

Nearly 40,000 viewers who called the premium-rate line had no chance of winning. But the researcher was congratulated for her “quick thinking” by producers and the programme’s editor failed to report the deception to BBC management. It was eventually exposed during a wave of phone-in scandals when an adult who had been in the studio blew the whistle. Ofcom found the BBC guilty of “serious breaches” of the broadcasting code, “deception” and of making a child “complicit” in that deception.

The BBC was fined £45,000 for misleading viewers. Ofcom imposed a further £5,000 penalty because the programme was repeated in full on CBBC, the children’s channel.

The watchdog said: “The breaches involved a preplanned decision to fake a winner in the interests of ensuring the smooth running of a programme, and in doing so made a child complicit in events leading to the deception. The decision to involve the child in the deception for the sake of expediency demonstrated a casual lack of regard for the welfare of that child. This was material which should not, in any circumstances, have been either produced or transmitted.”

It added that the issues raised “go to the heart of the relationship of trust between the broadcaster and its audience – in this case, an audience which is primarily made up of children”. Ofcom also identified “a series of serious and avoidable management and compliance failures”.

The BBC said that the imposition of the first statutory fine against the corporation was disproportionate. The corporation said that it acknowledged the grave breach of its standards and would no longer conduct phone-in competitions in such a way.

But Ofcom was unimpressed with the BBC’s attempt to shift the blame entirely to the researcher, who had raised concerns about the competition before broadcast but was ignored.The fine reflects regulators’ determination to crack down on phone-in competitions where viewers have been deceived. Ofcom imposed a record £300,000 fine on Five, the television channel, for faking the winners of a phone-in quiz on Brainteaser.

Last week Icstis, the premium-rate regulator, fined Eckoh, the call company that ran the You Say We Pay quiz on the Channel 4 Richard & Judy show, £150,000 for breaches of the broadcasting code. Ofcom has said that similar cases would be dealt with “extremely seriously”.

The BBC Trust has commissioned a policy review into the use of premium-rate services during programmes.

A spokesman said: “The trust expects BBC management to continue to demonstrate a commitment to learning from these breaches. The culture of the BBC must be such that any proposal to mislead audiences is instantly dismissed as wholly inappropriate.”

Explore UK News

• Crime News

• Education News

• Health News

• Science News

• Scotland News

Times Recommends

• Infertile couples to be made an NHS priority
• Sharp fall in number of GCSE entries
• Britain has more pensioners than children