Sky News reports today that Bill Nighy, the veteran British actor, has obviously touched a raw nerve in the City.
Nighy’s endorsement of a global ‘Robin Hood Tax’ on the world’s banks attracted international media coverage earlier this week. In a short film to promote the launch, Nighy plays a banker who eventually agrees to a 0.05% tax on international bank transactions to raise up to £250bn annually to fight poverty and climate change in the UK and abroad.
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Another year, another list of blunders, where people left right and centre are faced with the consequences of their public relations crisis handling. Of course plenty of good things happened in 2009, but there also appeared to be a whole list of mistakes which left a lot of people rather red-faced.
When journalists wave chequebooks around, anything is possible. John Terry would be just another testosterone-fuelled zip-challenged booter if it weren’t for one thing – the World Cup.
Suddenly, the entire self-respect of a nation hangs on the actions of one man. No, not Terry. Max Clifford. Strange how when nobody can make sense of a confused situation Max is always there to steer the media and the actual people involved through it all.
When in trouble, always signal loud and clear that you understand the public’s views (even if you don’t agree with them) – that’s a golden rule we emphasise time and again throughout our crisis training courses. Would that the MPs, or the social worker in charge of the Baby Peter case had listened….and now the hapless Baroness Ashton finds herself in the firing line for the same reason.
It was all going so well down at the Chilcot enquiry. The suave former Attorney General Lord Goldsmith seemed to have no difficulty in swatting away his questioning by Sir Roderic Lyne. They may have been launched like exocets, but they arrived like flies.
Rather like former Home Secretary Michael Howard’s famously endless ability to twist and spin so that Jeremy Paxman’s questions failed again and again to elicit a straight answer, Lord Goldsmith answered a question with a question, posed philosophical conundrums and generally cast doubt about the very purpose of the entire enquiry.
Training some highly qualified and expert technicians currently driving the global rush towards 3D cinema and television, we were captivated and excited about the wonderful new world all this technology is opening up. Who would have thought that surround sound would work on a laptop?
And who needs it? All of us once we’ve tried it apparently. But in a media interview there’s an easy way to trip up even the most fervent evangelist. In this case, ask them if they actually have their wonderful systems installed in their own homes. Happily, they all did. And very proud of them they were, too.
Phew – many’s a spokesperson has been badly caught out with that one simple question.
Axis Media Group has been crowned one of the country’s top public relations agencies after scooping a major award at the prestigious CIPR PRide Scotland Awards.
Accepting the Silver Award for Outstanding Small Consultancy was Axis Media Group’s managing director Paul Murricane. He said: “Axis Media Group is small in size, but mighty in everything that we do
“As PR professionals with mainly journalistic backgrounds, we have an unreserved dedication to telling the stories that make our clients stand out.
“Scooping this award for the second year running is testament to the hard work put in by all the team.”
A debate is currently raging in The Times about the Government’s handling of the release of the Libyan Bomber. Today, the Education Secretary told reporters: “I have to say that none of us wanted to see the release of al-Megrahi,”. But rewind to Saturday, when the Prime Minister told reporters he “respected” the decision of the Scottish Executive to free the man convicted of killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew members on Pan Am Flight 103, and 11 in the Scottish town of Lockerbie.
Anyone who downloads copyrighted music or video from a file-sharing site will shortly be getting a knock on the door from a uniformed chap holding a pair of wire cutters. Soon afterwards their ability to access the interweb will be less than zero. Welcome to the rule of law in Great Britain 2010, Mandelson-style.
According to the BBC’s main headline today the Government is proposing radical changes in the law to cut off internet users who access file-sharing sites. The Minister in charge of the Government’s Digital Britain project has ruled out the 2012 deadline for changes as “too late”. Peter Mandelson is reported in today’s Guardian as having concocted the new policy over dinner with American movie mogul David Geffen while on holiday in Corfu.
One, frankly quite easy trick trips up interviewees time and time again. It’s something that should be obvious to anyone before they agree to be interviewed. Yet in practically every media training course we do, it’s easy to bring a bluff interviewee crashing to the ground with one simple tactic. And it happened on GMTV this morning. Read the rest of this entry »
Another day, but not another dollar. Today it has been reported that the number of people claiming job-seekers allowance increased by 23,800 in June to 1.56 million; with the jobless total now hitting 2.38 million – the highest since 1995. Businesses are being advised to be careful with their costs, but unfortunately this seems to be at the expense of their workforce. Read the rest of this entry »
A new pandemic has risen, and we’re not talking about swine flu. The Guardian’s Wall Street correspondent, Andrew Clark, recently described US mega bank Goldman Sachs as a “blood–sucking vampire squid” – a new terror that feeds off the ‘green stuff’ rather than your immune system. That’s cash – not the need to go eco-friendly. Read the rest of this entry »
A selection of poets at the Ledbury Festival were asked, ‘what word do you hate and why?’ Their answers included ‘pulchritude’, from Philip Wells; ‘redacted’ from Geraldine Monk and ‘appal’ from Paul Batchelor, who explained that he can’t bear to hear his own name within other words. At Media Mentor, our least favourite words include ‘flesh’, ‘claustrophobic’ and, er, ‘Motherwell-nil’. Read the rest of this entry »
Today Jonathan Ross was cleared of causing offence (yes, again) to a group of 61 people who presumably have nothing better to do with their time or their stamps than complain about Jonathan Ross. Just to be clear – you are not in a time warp. Read the rest of this entry »
Furniture chain Habitat has come under fire this week for tweeting unethically. Half the world tweeting for news tagged #Iran were surprised to find details of the furniture chain’s lovely new spring range popping up.
Twitter has become a vitally important means of communication for the opposition movement in Iran, as the authorities have blocked access to email and news sites.
By exploiting ‘hashtags’ (keywords that allow Twitter users to follow popular topics) on the social networking site, Habitat were able to increase their following and promote their products to unsuspecting social networkers. Read the rest of this entry »
Will they never learn? Now that John Bercow has taken on the dignified mantel of the office of Speaker we should expect him to adopt a strange avuncular tone – rather stately, perhaps amused at the foolishness of mere MPs…shepherding his flock in a fatherly, unflappable way. But what do we see on ITV news? Asked a perfectly reasonable question by ITV political editor Tom Bradby “why do all conservatives hate you?” (Well it’s the question the public want answered) he lost his rag, and made the most basic mistake of all – he attacked the press. Read the rest of this entry »
This week saw the launch of a tasteless (boom, boom) advertising campaign for Burger King featuring Piers Morgan, the man we all love to hate (although, admittedly a bit less that Simon Cowell) and, well, very little else.
The former editor of the Daily Mirror and the News of the World appears lying naked in front of an open fire in the billboard adverts, with nothing more than a scrap of fabric to cover his, ahem, modesty.
At Media Mentor, we always reiterate the importance of key messages to our clients. I wonder if Burger King is confused about key messages? Read the rest of this entry »
Something happened on Radio 4’s Today programme which could mark a change in political interviews from now on. The emperor’s clothes suddenly disappeared. When John Humphries in exasperation asked the Chief Secretary to the Treasury Liam Byrne for a straight answer to a straight question, the answer he got was the usual political fudge. But this time, everybody – Humphries, Byrne, and the audience, saw it for what it was – a refusal to tell the electorate what its Government was doing. It would have been a normal, if unsatisfactory exchange a year ago. But in June 2009 it has become totally unacceptable. Later that day on Radio 4, Media Mentor’s Paul Murricane was interviewed on the PM programme. Presenter Eddie Mair wanted to know if companies like Media Mentor could train politicians to be honest. The answer Paul gave was crystal clear: the old ways of avoiding the question are dead and gone. Being honest is essential – but it may take some politicians quite a while to get used to it.
So the Electorate Has Spoke. And in response, those Labour politicians still standing have rounded vigorously on the extremist parties who snatched their votes. The new MEPs are “appalling” “dreadful” and “beyond the pale” (is that a pun?? – ed). Well, they’re right. Media Mentor has no difficulty in saying publicly that we would never accept the BNP or any other racist organisation as a client (not that they have asked…) But the mainstream parties, for which we believe the party of Government still qualifies, just, have got it wrong. They shouldn’t be attacking the miserable extremists. They should be admitting openly and honestly that they let this happen because of their failings. Here’s how you spell it Gordon: mea culpa. Meanwhile the leader of the BNP is given the prime slot on Radio 4’s Today programme: nearly seven minutes, and all before Labour Deputy Leader Harriet Harman was allowed to speak. Nick Griffin is not a total berk. A total Burke once said: “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing”.
