West Berkshire Council stabs itself in the foot with knife crime PR blunder

Public sector public relations is always a challenge. Your organisation represents the people, who by the very nature of democracy are unlikely to be universal in their approval - which is why it beggars belief that West Berkshire Council would stab itself in the foot by appearing soft on knife crime - in the middle of a trial of five teenagers who stabbed a local lad to death.

Newbury Today sets the incredulous tone with this article, an interpretation that must surely have been blindingly obvious would be the outcome.

Before starting Morgan PR, when I was a press officer with Thames Valley Police in Newbury and Reading, I co-operated with the media as much as possible in the very real expectation that at some point in the future I would need their co-operation in return. Mistakes are made in the public sector and being able to buy and hour or two of patience from a journalist who has scented blood - often literally - can be invaluable.

Day to day it simply bought you the benefit of the doubt. Journalists would trust you and give you the space to do the job of representing the police rather than reacting to the media. It also avoided stand offs such as that which happened at the Oxford Mail where they printed blank spaces 'where crimes we are not being told about should be reported' Ouch!

Now the Newbury Weekly News, the printed parent of the online Newbury Today takes a justifiably challenging approach to the seemingly arrogant stance so readily adopted by West Berkshire's elected councillors and often the council's officers too. Whether it is refusing to apologise for the roadworks causing traffic jams (surely you can feel sorry, without actually saying sorry?) or simply refusing to accept that the rising bollards that keep destroying errant vehicles might be legally sound, but morally unfair? Keeping them in place when it is clear they catch out motorists and wreck their cars is a complete nonsense.

Then there are crisis management case we have managed that defy belief at the way the council has behaved, often spending vast amounts of taxpayers' money with no obvious benefit.

So, in the latest chapter West Berkshire Council says it is against the public interest to presume to prosecute shops that sell knives to children. Newbury Today reports:

Officials said that under Crown Prosecution Service guidelines, prosecuting shops selling knives to children may not always be in the public interest. Presuming in favour of prosecution could “cast doubt” on whether each case was being assessed on its merits, trading standards officers said.

Does that sound like nonsense to anyone else? Surely you catch someone selling knives to kids they presume to prosecute until the merits suggest otherwise. Not so hard, is it?

Now for our PR lesson in all this! What should West Berkshire Council have done?

It really isn't difficult to work out! How about "Promised to investigate", or "Address this matter with urgency". Something to buy time and allow the situation to diffuse. They could have said they would investigate and simply shown they were aware of how strongly people felt - especially while under the scrutiny of a reporter expected to provide a story! Or with the proper planning could have anticipated the issue would up and bite them and avoided the controversy all together by doing the right thing for the community.

Still, look on the bright side - at least Noel Edmonds wasn't there, just waiting for another opportunity to rant on Noel's HQ!

Never become the story - Noel Edmonds pounces on press officer quip

He was never so agitated on Swap Shop! I'm talking about Noel Edmonds, who went postal at a press officer via his charitable show on Sky 1, Noel's HQ and in doing so delivers a terrific example of how becoming the story can be a disaster for a press officer.

Now I've not seen any more than this clip, preferring to keep Noel (and Keith Chegwin) in my 'Memories from a time of innocence' file, along with such gems as Pipkins and Bagpuss, but essentially get the idea that the show does good, not least through public indignation.

This exchange came about over Wealden District Council's rejection on planning grounds of a bungalow for a disabled war veteran - normally the preserve of local papers and regional TV, this has become major story courtesy of a press officer provoking Noel.

Watch:



The killer line. The words that cost this press officer so dearly were his policy-based dismissal that the council 'did not speak to entertainment shows'. I wonder if the press officer realised his mistake the second the words tumbled from his mouth?

Have the press team at Wealden District Council never seen Watchdog? Baiting the spokesman is brilliant TV sport and has nothing to due with truth and everything to do with whipping up indignation and anything that is dismissive of the programme - and therefore the viewers it attracts - is a recipe for red-faces. When the viewers are tax payers (regardless if they live in Wealdon) then you need to switch to crisis management mode pronto.

Noel HQ is suddenly viral gold and appearing all over the web and will no doubt pick up more viewers - which is surely coincidence.

You should never become the story when you are a press officer - unless it helps your organisation of course. Back when I was a press officer at Thames Valley Police I was snapped at Reading Festival and the photo below appear across seven columns of Saturday's Guardian. All very entertaining - but at that morning's press conference there were more questions about that photo then there were about a rape at the festival and certainly less column inches appeared.


To an extent being a police press officer is a little different; when a detective argues he is trying to catch a murderer and would rather you front up the cameras, it is hard to argue back. But then I was a paid spokesman whose role included appearing on camera.

Somewhere in the archives there is footage of a brick bouncing of my hard hat (which I had questioned the wisdom of wearing as it made me look more builder than police PR!) and I am sure there is footage of me ripping into a journalist or six. But never where in itself it would become the story.

Personally I always wanted to come up against political comic Mark Thomas on one of his visits to the atomic weapons factory at Aldermaston - which would have been flirting with the risk of TV exposure of the most ridiculing kind, but it never happened!

Snap, Crackle & Pot - Kellogg drops Michael Phelps - and he faces swim ban - how PR failed swim star

Saying too little too late is costing Olympic gold medalist swimmer Michael Phelps dearly with a three month swim ban and he has been dropped by a PR savvy sponsor - all because his own PR advisers blinked when faced by a News of the World exclusive photo of him apparently smoking cannabis.

We blogged about Phelps and the fundamental crisis management blunders earlier this week (catch up here and more recently here) and have closely watched the media circus unfold: his apology for inappropriate behaviour - he never admitted smoking cannabis and the more careful media have never actually said that he did - he was only pictured with a bong. The media went crazy and are still bouncing off the walls.

The local sheriff where the party is alleged to have taken place is looking to prosecute Phelps, which is no doubt one of the reasons Phelps has not admitted anything other than being foolish - it would be easy to prove the criminal case if Phelps actually admitted anything more substantive!

How different would it have been if Phelps had gotten ahead of the maelstrom of negative PR by speaking up sooner? If the first avalanche of stories had contained the belated contrition he has displayed he might have escaped this ban. Instead the media and the anti-drug lobby has whipped itself into a frenzy that has led to USA Swimming announcing the three-month ban (which incidentally does not interfere with any major competitions)

The decision by Kellogg to drop Phelps is itself quite a PR savvy move. It turns out the contract only has a matter of weeks to run and mindful how many children eat their cereal from Phelps-emblazoned boxes, they have now won a huge amount of publicity for 'doing the right thing' without losing any benefit from the sponsorship. They said:

"Michael's most recent behaviour is not consistent with the image of Kellogg. His contract expires at the end of February, and we have made a decision not to extend his contract."

This leaves his other major sponsors - Speedo, Visa and Omega Watches -looking rather greedy in contrast and I would not be surprised to see them further break ranks. Especially if the News of the World has more photographs tucked away for this weekend - a common tactic by the leading Sunday tabloid.

Damage limitation was Michael Phelps' only option over News of the World cannabis bong exclusive

What must 14-times Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps be thinking today as he among the millions clicking on the News of the World's exclusive photograph of him appearing to be using a bong - or as they cunningly explains: 'The glass pipes are generally used to smoke cannabis.'

Whether Phelps did or didn't inhale is largely irrelevant as headlines spread across the web. Indeed the News of the World story never actually says he was smoking cannabis. The story will lead the majority of people to that conclusion, as will the photo below. But they never said it and that should delight their lawyers and insurance company in equal measure.

Morgan PR creates reputations, but we also protect them too and provide crisis management to a variety of clients and while we always prefer to be invited to calm the horses rather than pursuing the bolting variety, this does involve damage limitation too.

What is especially interesting in the News of the World story is how they also burn the PR company that tried to dig Phelps out of the monumental hole he had dived into. Normally the conversations between spin doctors and journalists happen in private and remain as such, regardless of the outcome. This is chiefly to preserve the relationship for future encounters.

However, take a look (if you haven't already read it) at the way it handled the pleading of the crisis manager trying to help Phelps:

Spokesman Clifford Bloxham offered us an extraordinary deal not to publish our story, saying Phelps would become our columnist for three years, host events and get his sponsors to advertise with us.

In return, he asked that we kill Phelps’ bong picture. Bloxham said: “It’s seeing if something potentially very negative for Michael could turn into something very positive for the News of the World.”

Ouch!

You have to hope that wasn't Bloxham's opening bid? To pay Phelps to pen a column for three years, taking his writing up to the 2012 Olympics in London, would cost a small fortune, likewise the hosting of events and how on earth advertisers would support this beggars belief. What is certainly shows is just how damaging they knew this story would be; what a splash it would make that would ripple through Phelps' career and unsettle sponsorship for £4 million. Therein lies the rub.

In reality there are stories so big, so juicy and so likely to appear elsewhere if a newspaper or other media take a pass, that crisis management is only ever going to be about damage limitation.

A better strategy here would have been what we call A&E - not so much Accident & Emergency, but it is just as much about immediate survival. For Morgan PR A&E is Acceptance and Explanation - once you accept that a story is going to appear, how can it be explained in a way that will be both plausible (if not honest!) and can begin to rehabilitate the media's target.

Obviously we are not privy to what Phelps did or didn't do at the party, but what evidence is out there? Is this the only photo? Is there video (no doubt the News of the World will follow this up next week)? And who are the witnesses and what motivation do they have? If you can answer these questions accurately then it is possible to start building a strategy for a healthy recovery.

What the prognosis for Phelps? It is hard to say with certainty - his talent is such that if drug tests remain clean then he should continue to flourish - albeit with frequent reference to this incident. Of course, if he fails a drug test, pulls out of any forthcoming events so he is not tested, or the News of the World has more tucked beneath its swim cap...

Supermarket weep! Somerfield fumbles the PR ball and deserves to lose customers

Crisis management is not for the faint-hearted. Wobble, waiver or blink and you can be dead in the water - or face down in the fresh produce aisle if you are Somerfield in the wake of the staff instigated Chip and Pin fraud in Hungerford.

How incredulous was I to read their unhelpful comments in today's Newbury Weekly News and online at Newbury Today? I'd be shaking my head in sorry disbelief if that didn't make it hard to post this!

Let me recap for those yet to be stunned by the mismanagement of a retailer who is dependent on customer confidence for survival: A staff member has been sacked after stealing 'hundreds of pounds' from customers' accounts after adapting a Chip and Pin machine to clone their cards. Some 14 people were victims and the theft was only rumbled because the banks cried foul.

What jumps out? 'Sacked' - so someone in a position of trust commits a sophisticated and well planned fraud and is sacked. Not arrested so the crime - which is almost certainly more than the work of one person working alone - can be investigated and we can be reassured.

Newbury Today has the store's press officer blundering through comments as follows:

Spokesman for the store, Pete Williams, confirmed a worker had been sacked.

He said that a chip and pin card-reading device had been stolen and tampered with so that it cloned customers' bank details, which could then be used for illegal transactions.

Mr Williams said that quick action from the store's manager had prevented hundreds more customers from having their details stolen.

He said he could not confirm exactly how much money was involved.

“We have increased our security measures at the store since this incident,” he said.“We offer our apologies to those customers who were affected. Fortunately, they are fully covered by their banks,” he said.

He said the police had interviewed the dismissed staff member, but Thames Valley Police spokeswoman Laura Deane said the force had no record of any incidents.

Mr Williams said the case may have been referred to UK payments association APACS, which investigates many similar cases every year, but spokeswoman Sandra Quinn could not confirm or deny whether they were investigating the scam in Hungerford for security reasons.

First let me look at how I feel as a customer of this store. This is the impact of this statement:

I feel really angry that this has been allowed to happen and that it doesn't appear to be subject to a police investigation - do they not consider it serious enough? It is like they are saying: 'No worries - it is only customers' money'! Without knowing what happened and how sophisticated the scam was I am very reluctant to return to the store. I feel that the customers' losses are belittled by the assertion that the banks will refund the money. Oh well, that's alright then! Honestly!

From a PR point of view there are a multitude of ways this could have been handled better. The line about increasing security does work, but how differently would people feel if the statement had said:

"We deeply regret this incident and would seek to assure our many customers in Hungerford that every step has been taken to ensure that this cannot be repeated. Obviously this is a crime and Thames Valley Police has been asked to investigated so it would be innappropriate to comment further at this time."

You would be better advised to limit your exposure by keeping the comment brief, and involving the police effectively makes the matter sub judice so you could not comment much further without risking compromising the investigation.

Customers would have felt reassured and with less said there is less to interpret or feel unhappy about.

Morgan PR offers public relations advice as part of our crisis management service; if Somerfield had spoken to us about this we would have hopefully influenced a much less harmful outcome.