You’d expect that in these times of economic difficulty – and with the Council’s budget extremely tight – that the last thing you’d expect the Council to be doing is increasing the spend on generic marketing. Alas a decision notice has just dropped into my e-mail inbox and this is what it says:
I, Councillor John Merry, Leader of the Council , in exercise of the powers conferred on me by Paragraph J (1) of Section 2, of the Scheme of Delegation of the Council do hereby Authorise that the council publication LIFE IN Salford increases its frequency to monthly, its size to 24 pages and extends its distribution to include business premises
LIFE in Salford is the Council’s in-house magazine. The total cost of the magazine to local residents will now be £174,804.
It beggars belief that at a time when local residents are struggling with their bills and the Council itself is struggling with huge commitments that the Labour leadership are proposing a significant increase in spending on glossy magazines. I’m appalled.
Residents are paying far too much already for the Council’s marketing department, and the Council should be cutting the marketing spend to give greater value-for-money for taxpayers – something that has been proposed in every recent Conservative alternative budget.
[Again] Well said Iain. This magazine is nothing more than propaganda and self-congratulation. There is nothing newsworthy or interesting or of any value in it. What it does do is allow the Labour Party to spend taxpayers’ money on promoting itself and indulging those ‘partner organisations’ with which it is cosy.
Given the Manchester Evening News, the Salford Advertiser (and other publications) and the fact that the Council has a perfectly good website [and Salford Labour has a website] this magazine serves no purpose whatsoever.
If it were up to me [and perhaps also the Conservatives - but I can't speak for you] I’d scrap this magazine and thereby either save the £175,000 at a stroke or else make it available for something necessary and important. This magazine should be scrapped – not further expanded.
These are issues that need to go out to residents,i am sure your group will push the same as us to gain greater publicity regarding this kind of waste.The money we, sorry the money they waste is obscene and both our parties have tried to let the locals know perhaps we are failing not forcing the issue.
joe
Iain,
Forgive my lack of knowledge on this but are the Council not planning to sell more advertising spaces within the magazine to cover the increase in cost?
Adam.
According to the supporting documents Adam, of the total cost of £174k per annum they have budgeted for advertising income of £36k. This leaves the Council taxpayer liable for the remaining £138k per annum.
Of course in reality the taxpayer generally will be paying the bulk of the £174k as the adverts will come largely from public sector organisations. Indeed the documentation says that the Primary Care Trust has already committed to adverts.
The decision taken at this time does need some explaining even when you add the 55k of the existing budget with the target revenue from advertising it still leaves £83k to be found.
I would have thought that keeping things as they are at 6 publications a year was not only good practice but adequate.