The federal broadcast regulator has ordered Radio-Canada to apologize to viewers and implement safeguards to prevent another broadcast like Bye Bye 2008.

The comedy show, aired on New Year's Eve 2008 on the CBC's French-language network, drew 250 complaints to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission.

The satirical show included jokes about blacks and anglophones that offended viewers, including a comedian suggesting Barack Obama would be easy to assassinate because a black U.S. president would stand out against the White House.

In a report released Monday, the CRTC found the sketch to be abusive and a breach of the equitable portrayal code of the Broadcast Act.

The sketches, some of which connected black people with crime, breached provisions of television broadcasting regulations and the conditions of licence for the public broadcaster, the CRTC said in a news release issued Monday.

The regulator said the Bye Bye 2008 broadcast contravened codes concerning the portrayal of visible minorities, and it was aired without viewer advisories at a time when children might be watching television. A rebroadcast was aired at 8 p.m. the next evening.

The CRTC ordered the network to apologize in a "timely manner" for both breaches.

Radio-Canada spokesman Marc Pichette said the network "takes note of the CRTC decision."

He pointed out that the French-language network has already apologized about Bye Bye 2008, including a public letter to the newspapers from the Radio-Canada vice-president.

The public broadcaster is examining ways to issue a more elaborate apology and will consider what kind of guidelines could be put in place to prevent a future broadcast that goes too far, Picette told CBC News.

The rebuke follows a report from the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council in May that also said the jibes about blacks went too far.

There were also complaints about:

• A portrayal of child star Nathalie Simard.
• Portrayals of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, aboriginals and other groups, including anglophones.

Neither the CBSC nor the CRTC found those sketches violated broadcast standards.

The CBSC complained that portrayal of the family of hockey player Patrick Roy that included domestic violence breached the broadcast codes around depicting violence, but the CRTC did not agree.

The violence was "obviously simulated and comically exaggerated" and did not, in fact, glamorize violence, the CRTC said in its decision.

The Bye Bye broadcast is an annual tradition in Quebec and has an eyebrow-raising style that's as much about shock as it is about laughs.

The CBC argued in its petition to the CRTC that the show should be regarded as satire. The regulator dismissed the argument, saying Bye Bye 2008 was not up to the standards expected of Canadian broadcasters.

The also CRTC urged the CBC to join the CBSC, a self-regulator that now covers only private sector broadcasters.