Tuesday 28 February 2012

Government Lobbying Government

With all this wrangling over the Health Bill, you could be forgiven for thinking the NHS is short of a bob or two. Not that you'd notice in some areas.


The above hoarding would appear to have been commissioned by NHS Smokefree South West and the order placed with this company, who don't look like they're averse to issuing the odd eye-watering invoice.

On top of the design fees, as far as I can ascertain, this space would cost around £200 per week and, of course, we don't know how many of them there are dotted around, or for how long. Add on printing costs and beer money for the bill posters and we're talking a pretty penny being spent from your taxes, I reckon.

All this, remember, purely and simply to lobby the government on a public consultation which has yet to be published!

Back in August 2010, Eric Pickles had this to say on such activity.
Government agencies and councils in England that spend public money on lobbying ministers face a crackdown.

Communities Secretary Eric Pickles said it was wrong that taxpayers' money was being spent on political lobbying.
He was quite right, especially when he referred to it as "the wasteful practice of government lobbying government", which this most definitely is.

Not 'cracking down' very hard, are you Eric? They're taking the right royal piss out of you.


18 comments:

Mark Wadsworth said...

"Not 'cracking down' very hard, are you Eric?"
No of course he isn't, what made you think he would?

Dick_Puddlecote said...

It's that hope over experience thing again, I have a problem with it. ;)

Lysistrata Eleftheria said...

DP, you keep me sane. You give me reason to live.

Jay said...

Gotta love how plain packs protect children, all zero of them.  I'm beginning to believe that the people who use the "protect the children" argument are most likely to be paedos.  I mean, if you focus so much on children, you must really, really like them. Right?  In line with that thinking, I wonder:  when ASH recruit kids for protests, do the adults need CRBs?  Should the nannies need CRBs before polling kids?

Jay said...

apologies for the formatting thing... was trying to be clever... failed.

Dick_Puddlecote said...

"Gotta love how plain packs protect children, all zero of them."
Funny you should say that. Isn't it against ASA guidelines to make false or unproven claims? Just a thought. 

Jay said...

Well, yes, but ... evidently the government is exempt. If it were not exempt, nearly every politician and agency head would be in jail.  So no, these rules and guidelines only apply to us unsuspecting peasants and to very large corporations who have a lot of money that the government needs in order to produce bullshit advertisements to control every aspect of lives.

I'm not bitter, though... just inching my way towards that inevitable revolution.  We are, all of us, riding an invisible wave of malcontent heading straight for the gates of Parliament.

George Speller said...

 It's child exploitation. will nobody think of the cheeeldren?

therealguyfaux said...

"For the children" can be as much the refuge of the scoundrel as patriotism is supposed to be.

SadButMadLad said...

So plain packaging protects children, who aren't allowed to buy them in the first place.

Might as well have a law that says alcohol must be sold in plain green bottles to protect the children. The fact that children aren't allowed to buy alcohol won't stop the NHS using it as as argument for their next advertising campaign.

Bucko TheMoose said...

Is that Yoda in the next billboard along? Are they having a pop at little people too now?

Jay said...

No. The great Yoda is there to remind us that:  "To a dark place plain packs will carry us. Great care we must take." 

Mrvividart said...

The caption should read ;- 'there is nothing to see here - move on'!
Bastardising and  denormalising phrases as well as minds.
Fuck'em
-Sok

John M said...

There's a load of these posters in my home town of Bournemouth. I wonder who is paying for them, since apparently there is fuck all money for tax reductions, or anything else according to our beloved chancellor.

Perhaps Duncan Bannatyne is paying for them or something.

Carl Simpson said...

Plain packs will help protect future generations of children, not stop current smokers. The large majority of teens/adults, when asked, would be able tell you at least 10 different cigarette brand names and what colour their packaging is. The tobacco companies rely on their packaging to have any brand recognition and presence. Regardless of what colour the packaging is, all cigarettes are highly dangerous, eg. a Marlboro light is as damaging as a Marlboro red, the pacakging is misleading.

Dick_Puddlecote said...

Nice copy and paste from the other sites where you've posted that, Carl. We know the propaganda, you're wasting your time posting such irrelevant crud here, though. 

ASH said...

They don't need brands or advertising to smoke weed, roll ups or take ecstasy, shoot up or whatever else they want to do.  This plain packaging is a load of bollocks pushed by a bunch of self righteous killjoys, in my humble opinion.  Govt should be focused on deficit reduction.

James Pickett said...

"Plain packs will help protect future generations of children"

Zat so? I think you'll find they couldn't care less about the packaging. Just because they can recognise it doesn't mean they don't care about the contents. I like the Gauloise packaging, but the cigarettes are revolting!