An advert campaign launched across London to celebrate ten years of Sadiq Khan being in office as mayor used thousands in taxpayer cash. Vanity publishing latest…
Khan was first elected on 7 May, 2016 and posters started appearing – especially on the TfL network – at around that time. A campaign video started with audio snippets and headlines reporting Khan’s re-election…
FOI disclosures now show that the printing costs reached £2,409.16 from the central marketing budget. The Greater London Authority added “internal hours/costs are not logged according to specific projects in this manner.” Convenient…
The ad campaign was widespread: it ran across a whopping 1533 public transport posters, online ads and a one-day quarter page Metro print advert. “In addition, 53 digital screens were used in the city via pro bono media partnerships.” All over the shop…-
Khan defended the campaign in City Hall questions, saying:
“I take a huge sense of pride in what this city has achieved over the last few years, as recognised by international awards and so forth, and it is a recognition of that, and we should have civic pride in what this city has done and continues to do. If we do not have pride in our city, why should others?”
The GLA said “allocation of TfL inventory is provided at no cost.” How much potential advertising cash was lost out because Khan shoved posters celebrating himself on the network?
Tom Baldwin, author of Starmer’s hagiography, spoke to Times Radio:
Tom Baldwin: “I think he’d like to do something. He’s very dutiful and driven by service. That’s why he came into politics. I think that’s characterised his time as prime minister. He hasn’t always sought popularity or been good at being popular. But I think he has some of the necessary qualities that we actually do want in a prime minister. That resilience, that relentlessness, that ability to carry the weight and the job really does weigh very heavily on people and he carries that weight very, very well.”
Jo Coburn: “NATO Secretary-General?”
Tom Baldwin: “I think that’s something that he would be interested in. I think it probably requires Andy Burnham’s government to support him in that and these are some of the questions which Andy Burnham has to resolve quite quickly.”