Liverpool council PR disaster #63598
Tuesday, 21 August 2007
This is a real beauty. Somehow, the Liverpool Daily Post has got hold of an e-mail from Liverpool council leader Warren Bradley to council chief executive Colin Hilton demanding that the chief executive of the Liverpool Culture Company, Jason Harborow, should resign over the fiasco involving this year’s Mathew Street festival. Gleefully, they have printed the whole thing in toe-curling detail. It’s a corking story.
Harborow is responsible for organising the European Capital of Culture celebrations next year and is a senior council officer. Bradley, the political leader, requests “decisive action” over Harborow’s resignation and says “nothing short of my request will be deemed acceptable”.
Quite what would happen if Hilton fails to acquiesce a mystery. Perhaps Bradley should have signed off “Hasta La Vista, Baby” in order to force the issue because as far as I’m aware - and I’m no expert - the political leader of a council has no power to demand the resignation of an officer, whether “mandated by the ruling group” or not. To then suggest promotions and reorganisations within various council departments merely adds to the faux pas.
The fundamental problem the council faces is that any action it wants to undertake seems to be thwarted by the unrelenting willingness of its employees and others to leak embarrassing material to the media. The impression that Liverpool is run by a rabble, which perversely enjoys airing its dirty laundry in public, is thus reinforced across the country.
Notice how one of Bradley’s first concerns within his e-mail is about how this plays out in the media and how it “must be handled carefully”. Oh dear.
