An award-winning RTE report on a Dublin psychiatric hospital was not an objective and impartial treatment of the issues concerned, according to the Broadcasting Complaints Commission.
It upheld a complaint against RTE by the Eastern Health Board about a report featuring St Ita's Hospital, Portrane.
The commission said the report in March was "unfair to the Eastern Health Board staff and board, and the Eastern Health Board was not given adequate opportunity to refute the allegations. While purporting to deal with mentally handicapped persons in the country generally, the broadcast emphasised St Ita's and created the impression that the criticisms made related to this hospital."
The use of file pictures of the hospital without clearly identifying them as such was especially misleading, it said.
In its defence, RTE said the EHB did not make anyone available for interview before the broadcast. It believed the series and report were fair and that recent concerns about mental health services warranted a "hard-edged and critical exploration which is of public interest". The reporter, Mr Tony Connelly, recently won an ESB media award for the report.
