It turns out that the £30,000 Sadiq Khan blew on Freud Communications to find celebrities to tweet about his pet social media campaign was only the tip of the iceberg of his egoistic largesse. Guido can reveal that the Mayor has in fact shelled out almost £300,000 to the swanky PR firm in the two and a half years since he became Mayor in 2016. How can he justify spending this much on self-congratulatory campaigns when Crossrail is heading towards being £2 billion in the red and TfL is facing a £1 billion operating deficit?

The Mayor’s Office was forced to release figures detailing exactly how much has been spent on Freuds – £126,000 in 2016/17, £120,000 in 2017/18, and £48,000 so far this financial year, totalling £294,000. This is just part of the £2.8 million increase in PR and marketing spend since Sadiq became Mayor, and on top of the fifteen press officers he already employs. All paid for by the taxpayer…

After turning London’s £3 million firework display into an attention-seeking exercise for himself, Sadiq is now blowing yet more taxpayers’ cash on a swanky PR firm to promote his #LondonIsOpen campaign on Twitter. Despite TfL facing a £1 billion operating deficit and Crossrail now requiring emergency loans of up to £2 billion – which Londoners will have to pay back – Sadiq has somehow managed to find £30,000 down the back of the sofa to splurge on PR outfit Freud Communications. Their job is to find high-profile people to tweet about it…

Guido readers may remember Freud Communications as part of the nexus of Remain campaign groups which sprung up in the final month of the referendum and had over £1 million funnelled to them by a tiny handful of mega-rich donors.

Publicity-obsessed Sadiq has overseen a £2.8 million increase in PR and marketing spend since becoming Mayor and already employs fifteen press officers at City Hall. Was there not a single one who was capable of doing this job themselves?