Because the public now relies less on professional news media to receive important information, governments need more options and methods to alert the public to legal and regulatory violations by regulated parties, research by Consumers Council of Canada found.
The report Consumer Perspectives on the Effectiveness of Regulatory Name and Shame included a national web panel survey of 2,000 Canadians.
Participants indicated they relied mostly on television reports to learn about important regulatory warnings today, but the reach of social media is expected to become more vital in getting news of legal and regulatory misdeeds to Canadians.
The success of ‘name and shame’ by governments, regulators and administrative authorities is highly dependent on context, choice of medium and communications and messaging framing. The days of simply issuing a public notice, and expecting conventional media to reach the general public is ending.
“Consumers consider social media – including social media from other consumers – as likely to be ore effective in changing corporate behaviour in the future than public notices from compliance organizations,” the report says.
The report also notes that regulatory ‘name and shame’ has been ineffective in achieving compliance when it is the most severe sanction available to a compliance organization.
In other notable findings:
• Consumers hold positive views but the importance of ‘name and shame’ as a tool of regulatory compliance.
• Consumers alter their shopping behaviour after learning of a violation.
• Consumer memory of past violations is limited
• Consumers show some faith in the power of other consumers to spread awareness of bad business conduct
• Consumers have become cynical that penalties improve industry behaviour and none of the government actions to ’name and shame’ Canada’s grocers were viewed as having significant effect on grocery prices.
The research also found many compliance organizations are reluctant to make public corporate violations and associated details, even when they could. Yet consumers want to be told when business violate laws, regulations and standards and want to know details of infractions.
Consumers Council of Canada received funding from Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada’s Contributions Program for Non-profit Consumer and Voluntary Organizations. The views expressed in the report are not necessarily those of Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada or of the Government of Canada.