Tory leader claims cost of Fair Deal adverts is too high
DERBY'S Tory opposition leader has criticised the city council's spending of thousands of pounds on adverts for its Fair Deal campaign as a "political mugging of the electorate".
The campaign, which is demanding more cash from the Government, had enjoyed cross-party support but, as revealed in the Derby Telegraph last week, councillor Philip Hickson's Conservatives pulled out of the deal.
He cited the cash spent on advertising to drum up support as a reason for the move.
The council's chief executive Adam Wilkinson has revealed that, to date, the authority had spent £3,853 on advertising.
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And leader of the city's ruling Labour group, councillor Paul Bayliss said that "as far as he was concerned" that's where the spending stops.
But Mr Hickson claims the figure may mask "labour costs" for the advertising and believes 15 current planning applications for new advertising positions in the city will initially be used for more Fair Deal campaigning.
He said: "The total number of new advertising positions in those applications is about 240. We've never needed them before so why should we need them now? I believe they will all be used for Fair Deal."
"It's a political mugging of the electorate – using money for these purposes."
The messages on the posters and banners say things such as "Government cuts ...Your children's services will be affected...", which Mr Hickson said was overtly political.
He said: "If the spending decisions Labour makes affect these services then it's down the choices they make."
Mr Bayliss said the council did not go ahead with advertising the Fair Deal campaign until it had cross-party support.
He said: "We have minimised the cost of the campaign to the council. The advertising space was basically all ours for free.
"The posters were never put up where we needed the advertising space for other things, such as advertising the Christmas panto, and when some retailers said they didn't want the posters near their shops we took them down."
He said some of the new advertising space applied for might be used for Fair Deal but that the main reason for it was to create an extra revenue source for the council and to make more space for the authority to advertise its events.
He said: "I wouldn't have thought we would be spending any more."
Councillor Hilary Jones, leader of the council's Liberal Democrats, said her party would be considering its position on the Fair Deal campaign at its next meeting on Wednesday.
Comments
by Andrew_Ilson
Monday, January 14 2013, 7:22PM
“The current posters have been up for ages.”
by Derby_born
Monday, January 14 2013, 7:03PM
“Andrew_Ilson, "These have been up for ages" - Ages? Here is a recent (Thursday January 10th 2012) article referring to the planning application for more than 250 banners to be erected around the city:
"Soapbox Maxwell Craven: Putting up anti-cuts banners will cost the city dear".
"ONE important item of business at the December meeting of the Conservation Area Advisory Committee was an application by the city council for Conservation Area Consent to erect banners to be fixed to the 16 lamps in the Market Place".
"The purpose was, apparently, to display giant and identical vertical banners attacking "the cuts"."
http://tinyurl.com/bhbs6gq
£3,853 for a few that have been posted, how much will it cost for a further 250 or more?”
by Andrew_Ilson
Monday, January 14 2013, 6:19PM
“These have been up for ages. Funny how they chirp up about cost now since Dave gave them a **********.”
by towercrane
Monday, January 14 2013, 3:43PM
“what a hecing waste of money”
by Derby_born
Monday, January 14 2013, 12:58PM
“As this article says, the bill so far has been £3853 for a few posters; the council has submitted a planning application for the placement of a further 250 or more banners and posters around the city, the banners mount to nothing less than a party political election campaign, so why should we pay for them? 4he cost will rise to much more than £3,853 by the time they have finished!
The Council House is owned by the city and will save millions in rented office space that they were paying out in rents to private landlords before the move back to the refurbished building.
This council needs to get it priorities right, they pay people for NOT collecting rubbish for a whole weekend, they want to charge us for recycling, yet they spend council tax money on an advertising campaign to tell us that they have no money to pay for essential services!”
by DCFCOAP
Monday, January 14 2013, 12:31PM
“Pales in comparison to the amount spent on doing up the council house and counciller's wages doesn't it?”
by Derby_born
Monday, January 14 2013, 9:06AM
“What advertising agency has the Council contracted to produce the adverts?
http://tinyurl.com/be7qyj5”