In the past week alone ASA has investigated complaints about two adverts. An advert for Tunnock’s Tea Cakes, showing a female tennis player holding a tea cake at the top of her bare thigh, was banned by the regulator on the basis that it objectified women.

Estelle Yuen, a spokesperson for ASA, told Stylist.co.uk: “While the image was only mildly sexual in nature, when combined with the double entendre, ‘serve up a treat’, it implied the woman featured in the ad was the ‘treat’. We considered this to be viewed as demeaning towards women.”

The ASA also investigated an ad for Paco Rabanne’s men’s fragrance XS, which showed a male model undressing in a bathroom while women secretly watched. The watchdog received 120 complaints that the ad was objectifying towards both men and women, but decided against banning it.

“While there were complaints that the ad objectified the featured man, we considered the ad’s context and tone, which was humorous in nature and not humiliating or denigrating to the man,” Yuen said. “Therefore, we did not uphold complaints against it.”

CAP (the Committee of Advertising Practice) is currently developing new standards and updated guidance for advertisers, due to come into effect later this year.

The ASA has also attributed the same dedication to adverts deemed to be racist. In 2017, the regulator censured betting company Paddy Power after an ad featuring the boxer Floyd Mayweather was ruled as racist.

Using a picture of a black boxer alongside Mayweather the company ran the headline ‘always bet on the black’, ahead of Mayweather’s comeback fight in Las Vegas in August.

After receiving nine complaints, they concluded: “We considered that readers would . . . be offended by the invitation to always bet on the outcome of a boxing match based on a boxer’s race.”

Just last month, three complaints were made against an ad created by The Buck Inn in Sadberge. Posted on Facebook, the ad for their ‘German Grub Night’ featured the phrases ‘Graham Ze Chef’ and ‘Don’t Mention Ze War!’, as well as an image of a swastika-wearing Nazi soldier.

The ASA ruled that the ads “must not appear again in their current form” and the use of Nazi imagery was “inappropriate and trivialised events of the Second World War and actions of the German Nazi party”.

Images: Jon Flobrant / Twitter

Stockholm is banning sexist and racist adverts – but where does the UK stand?