diff --git a/gst-libs/gst/tag/gstexiftag.c b/gst-libs/gst/tag/gstexiftag.c
index 2b2864cf35..d73859b828 100644
--- a/gst-libs/gst/tag/gstexiftag.c
+++ b/gst-libs/gst/tag/gstexiftag.c
@@ -1148,9 +1148,12 @@ parse_exif_ascii_tag (GstExifReader * reader, const GstExifTagMatch * tag,
 
     if (sscanf (str, "%04d:%02d:%02d %02d:%02d:%02d", &year, &month, &day,
             &hour, &minute, &second) > 0) {
-      gst_tag_list_add (reader->taglist, GST_TAG_MERGE_REPLACE, tag->gst_tag,
-          gst_date_time_new_local_time (year, month, day, hour, minute,
-              second), NULL);
+      GstDateTime *d;
+
+      d = gst_date_time_new_local_time (year, month, day, hour, minute, second);
+      gst_tag_list_add (reader->taglist, GST_TAG_MERGE_REPLACE,
+          tag->gst_tag, d, NULL);
+      gst_date_time_unref (d);
     } else {
       GST_WARNING ("Failed to parse %s into a datetime tag", str);
     }