BBC Scotland has been fined £35,000 following a phone in competition during Children in Need in 2005 in which it faked a winner to visit the set of CBBC programme, Raven.

The corporation was found to have breached Rule 2.11 which states that “Competitions should be conducted fairly, prizes should be described accurately and rules should be clear and appropriately made known.”

According to the report, one of the two call centres working on the telethon that night was to select ten random callers, with the list being passed to a BBC volunteer. That volunteer would then call each number in turn and ask if they would be interested in winning the prize. The first to say “yes” would be the winner.

However, it would seem that the arrangement was not communicated with the call centre staff and therefore no names were made available.

As a result, the producer chose create and announce a fictitious winner.
This was not a premium rate call in, with entrants paying a local charge for the call while also making a donation to Children in Need.

The BBC has already carried out two investigations into its handling of phone in competitions following similar events on Blue Peter. As a result, phone in competitions were suspended by the corporation while it implemented its review.

To read the full adjudication see