MURPHY v. IRELAND JUDGMENT 7 (b) the broadcast treatment of current affairs, including matters which are either of public controversy or the subject of current public debate, is fair to all interests concerned and that the broadcast matter is presented in an objective and impartial manner and without any expression of his own views: Provided that should it prove impracticable in relation to a single broadcast to apply this paragraph, two or more related broadcasts may be considered as a whole, if the broadcasts are transmitted within a reasonable period of each other; ... (2) Nothing in subsection (1) (a) or (1) (b) shall prevent a sound broadcasting contractor from transmitting political party broadcasts: Provided that a sound broadcasting contractor shall not, in the allocation of time for such broadcasts, give an unfair preference to any political party.” 26. Section 10(3) of the 1988 Act applied to independent radio and television broadcasters the same prohibition applied to RTE (by section 20(4) of the 1960 Act). Section 10(3) provided as follows: “No advertisement shall be broadcast which is directed towards any religious or political end or which has any relation to an industrial dispute.” 3. The Radio and Television (Amendment) Bill 1999 (“the 1999 Bill”) 27. This bill, never passed, proposed amending section 10(3) of the 1988 Act. This proposal was prompted by the Supreme Court's judgment in the present case and a subsequent prohibition of an advertisement by the Irish Catholic newspaper pursuant to that provision. During the parliamentary debate on this Bill, the Minister (for Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands) noted that: “Essentially we are dealing with a provision that is nearly 40 years old. It can be argued that it is timely to reconsider a prohibition such as is contained in these subsections. It can be argued that the blanket ban contained in these provisions is too blunt an instrument to be used in this day and age for what is now a largely well educated society with a sophisticated understanding of the way media, including the very powerful radio and television media, work. It is helpful to our debate that in the recent past the constitutionality of this very provision – that is, the prohibition on advertising directed towards a religious end – was tested in the courts during 1997 and 1998.” 28. Having referred in detail to the High and Supreme Court judgments in the present, the Minister went on: “In dealing with the Bill, we are considering a proposal by the Opposition to amend a legislative provision that was found to be constitutional as recently as May 1998. We are being asked to amend a provision that was found by the Supreme Court not to be arbitrary or unfair and which impairs our constitutional rights as little as possible. The High Court and the Supreme Court acknowledged the sensitivity of the substance of the existing provisions of the section which the Bill is designed to amend. Anyone who reads these judgments must come to the conclusion that any amendment of the section which would give an agent of the State the power or responsibility of deciding which types of religious advertisements are permissible and which are not must be