Manchester’s less than joined up council
Article published: Thursday, September 16th 2010
How much does the Council spend on PR? To hazard a guess, it’s more than they spend on ‘Democratic Services’, judging by the astonishing inefficiency that particular department demonstrates when dealing with Freedom of Information (FOI) requests. On 13 January MULE tried to find out how much, via this avenue. The ‘information’ came back on 1 July.For those unfamiliar with the Freedom of Information Act (2000), public bodies are required by law to deal with FOI requests within 20 working days – significantly less than five and a half months. The Council acknowledged receipt of the request, and again of the internal review into why they had still not sent the information over a month later. But after subsequent queries as to their progress, only a threat to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner finally jolted them into action. They apologised for the delay, without explanation for the wait or their continued refusal to respond to emails. So what about the information they took so long to find? They don’t have it. By the end of the 2009/10 financial year, Manchester City Council had “not yet moved to a single centralised budget for PR and marketing held by the Directorate of Communications. Instead, individual Council Departments made their own arrangements in relation to their individual PR, communications, marketing and press office requirements.” These facts seem particularly odd since, “in Jan 2009 Manchester City Council established a Directorate of Communications to enable the Council’s PR, communications, marketing and press officer functions to be dealt with centrally, rather than by individual Council Departments.” It gets worse. It was made clear to us that there was no point in asking each department directly, being pre-emptively informed: “Unfortunately, for the last two financial years, individual Council Departments have not categorised their spending in relation to PR, communications, marketing and press office requirements under a separate ‘PR and marketing expenditure’ budget.” Despite being given complete freedom when it comes to marketing, the individual departments don’t know how much they’re spending.
The Director of Communications is one Sara Tomkins, who has been in the post since its creation and was formerly of marketing firm Amaze. Amaze was the company behind the controversial Congestion Charge publicity for the Greater Manchester Public Transport Executive. You know, that failed campaign in which GMPTE’s TV ad was banned by Ofcom for being “weighted significantly towards the ‘yes’ result”?
Tomkins assured us that following the creation of the Directorate, “all future Council spend on PR and marketing…will be held centrally.” But, despite 18 months of her £75,000-per-year leadership and with nearly six months to find us an answer, the Council have still not managed to work out any spending figures, including the salaries of the 90 people employed in communications and PR, the press office and by m::four, the Council’s in-house communications agency.
Amaze-ing.
Luckily, the Council rarely wastes money and we’re living in a time of plenty, when essential services aren’t being pulled from underneath our feet. Only occasionally will the Council give Marketing Manchester an extra £420,000 by mistake and then declare itself unable to reclaim it due to a predicted “bureaucratic nightmare.”
All things considered, it’s no surprise that Manchester City Council is still struggling to collect Council Tax. Maybe the public is a bit more savvy than the Council credits, realising it’s probably best to keep hold of it, not knowing where the Council will waste it all next.
Andy Lockhart
This article features in the print edition of The Mule – Issue 10, out now for FREE around Greater Manchester
More: Manchester, News
Comments
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Great article – really insightful and a great piece of investigative journalism.
Comment by Nathan on September 17, 2010 at 3:52 pm -
This article gives an example of how the public sector is inefficient and unaccountable when it comes to our money.
We can make huge cuts in public expenditure with no harm to services. We could get rid of Sara Tomkins for a start, and she no doubt has a flock of assistants and advisers too, all on decent money. Overstaffing is the norm in local government these days.
Comment by simon on October 29, 2010 at 4:29 pm
The comments are closed.
