Advertising industry under fire in Parliament for abusing children in ads

Friday, 7 November 2014 00:04 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

By Ashwin Hemmathagama The advertising industry came under fire on Wednesday in Parliament for using minors in commercials, disregarding Government restrictions. Minister of Water Supply and Drainage and Chief Government Whip Dinesh Gunawardena joining the Committee Stage debate of the Ministry of Labour charged the enforcing officers of leaving room for exemptions. “It is so unfortunate that children are abused by the advertising industry. The Department of Labour is authorised to prevent this, but the relevant officers seems to be napping,” said Minister Gunawardena. According to Minister Gunawardena, the advertising industry makes millions out of commercials produced using children who are not paid substantially for the trouble taken. Requesting the Minister of Labour to take action preventing the use of children, Minister Gunawardena proposed urgent measures to ‘force’ the advertising industry players to ‘pay a suitable contribution’ to a children’s fund. “Please bring a mechanism that would assure the children appearing in advertisements are properly paid for their contributions. We should not permit child labour exploitation,” he added.

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