Event footage now answers to the strictest country that broadcasts it

A historic race car in period tobacco livery, running lawfully at a New Zealand event, has landed an Australian broadcaster in regulatory trouble. The lesson for business is blunt. Once your content crosses a border, the rules of the destination market apply, and nobody will care what was acceptable where it was filmed.

Twenty minutes at Highlands

The car ran at the New Zealand Grand Prix at Highlands Motorsport Park in January 2026, part of the NextGen Championship series. Fox Sports carried the coverage into Australia, a viewer complained, and the Australian Communications and Media Authority investigated.

In October, ACMA found Foxtel in breach of tobacco advertising rules. Branding from two cigarette brands appeared prominently and repeatedly across roughly 20 minutes of coverage, including slow-motion replays and a 40-second close-up. ACMA member Carolyn Lidgerwood said tobacco branding could have a promotional effect regardless of why it appeared. It was the regulator’s first tobacco advertising investigation under the Public Health (Tobacco and Other Products) Act 2023, and Foxtel responded with internal guidelines, quarterly staff reminders, training and revised processes for motorsport acquisitions.

Intent no longer matters

This is the part that should worry anyone exporting content. The 2023 Act removed the need to prove a broadcaster meant to promote tobacco, and stripped out the old exceptions for accidental or incidental broadcasts. Its definition of advertising is sweeping, covering any communication or action that promotes smoking, tobacco products or even the names of manufacturers, with maximum penalties of $6.6 million AUD for a body corporate and $660,000 for individuals.

Worse, the law presumes that a colour, design or visual treatment closely associated with a tobacco brand can be advertising. You do not need a logo on screen to be exposed. A paint scheme can do it.

New Zealand’s own regime is hardly lax. A 2025 fact sheet shows it already bans tobacco promotion across domestic and international broadcast, print, online, outdoor and event sponsorship. Yet nobody at the point of origin flagged the livery. The liability only crystallised in Sydney.

Australia was already tightening

This was not a bolt from the blue. In August, Foxtel pulled a Touring Car Masters broadcast over cigarette livery concerns before any finding had been made. In September, Motorsport Australia scrapped the exemptions that let historic cars race in period tobacco colours, and now requires a competitor whose livery is disputed to prove it does not promote tobacco. The burden of proof has flipped onto the car owner.

The international backdrop explains why none of this will reverse. Back in 2019, the WHO tobacco convention secretariat urged parties to ban tobacco promotion in all motor sports, and both countries are signatories.

The heritage argument has merit, and little legal weight

Kiwi organisers are understandably frustrated. NextGen chief executive Josie Spillane said there was “no commercial outcome, there’s no sponsors involved, there’s no product being distributed,” calling the fleet “a moving museum”. Supercars veteran Greg Murphy, who does not support smoking, argued that most generations would not even recognise these brands. They have a point. Nobody is taking up Benson & Hedges because of a 1980s Ford Sierra.

But the Australian test does not ask whether anyone was persuaded. It asks whether the imagery is associated with a brand. Sentiment will not get a broadcaster off a strict-liability charge, and broadcasters will protect themselves by demanding clean footage from suppliers. Tauranga driver Andy Greenslade has already rebadged his Sierra as “Banson and Hadges” for a Christchurch round televised into Australia, and New Zealand organisers are now reviewing the issue with broadcast partners, according to the same 1News report.

What smart rights holders do next

The practical takeaway reaches well beyond motorsport. Any New Zealand business selling broadcast or streaming rights, supplying footage, or buying visibility at an event with an export audience should assume the strictest receiving market sets the standard. That means auditing liveries, signage, merchandise and backdrops for anything an Australian regulator could read as promotion, and writing warranties and indemnities into rights contracts so the risk sits with whoever controls the imagery.

The same logic applies to alcohol, gambling, vaping and any other category where Australian rules run ahead of ours. Foxtel paid in reputation and compliance overhead this time. The next finding could involve the $6.6 million ceiling, and the broadcaster’s first call will be to the New Zealand supplier who sent the footage. Organisers who sort this out before the 2027 season will keep their Australian buyers. Those who argue history will find the buyers simply stop picking up the feed.

Sources

• 1News: NZ race cars spark tobacco ad controversy across Tasman (2026-11-08)
• ACMA: Foxtel breaches tobacco advertising rules (2026-10-20)
• Australian Department of Health: Guide to advertising and sponsorship prohibitions (2024-11)
• Auto Action: Motorsport Australia axes historic tobacco livery exemptions (2026-09-12)
• Auto Action: Foxtel pulls TCM race over cigarette livery concerns (2026-08-30)
• Tobacco Control Laws: New Zealand advertising, promotion and sponsorship fact sheet (2025-07-07)
• WHO FCTC: Secretariat urges Parties to ban all forms of tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship in all motor sports (2019-03-13)