Page 162 - An Introduction to Political Communication Fifth Edition

Intro to Politics Communication (5th edn)-p.qxp 9/2/11 10:55 Page 141

POLITICAL PUBLIC RELATIONS
be more discrete in its use of media management and political communication
techniques.
Following the furore caused by the Jo Moore e-mail the government set
up an independent review of the government communications apparatus,
chaired by former broadcasting executive Bob Phillis. Interest in the Phillis
review’s work was heightened in the wake of the Andrew Gilligan affair,
which began in May 2003. BBC reporter Gilligan had alleged on Radio 4’s
Today programme that, according to his anonymous source, the government
had ‘sexed up’ a dossier on the threat posed by Iraqi weapons of mass
destruction, in order to ease the way for war on Saddam Hussein. In the
ensuing clash between the government and the BBC, allegations of excessive
government spin by the prime minister’s Director of communication Alistair
Campbell and others, extending to the deliberate misleading of public and
parliamentary opinion, were set against suggestions that Gilligan and the
BBC had got their story wrong. A bitter dispute followed, in the course of
which Gilligan’s source, government scientist David Kelly, committed
suicide, throwing the spotlight on the machinations and manipulations of the
government communications apparatus as well as the BBC’s structures of
editorial management.
In order to defuse the growing scandal the government set up the Hutton
inquiry into the circumstances surrounding Kelly’s death, which reported in
January 2004 with findings critical of the BBC, and widely read as letting the
government off the hook. 10 Alistair Campbell had in any case resigned in
August 2003, citing family reasons. This was seen in some quarters as an
acknowledgement that under Campbell’s direction, government communi-
cations had become the problem rather than the solution, and that it was time
for a different style. Campbell was replaced as the government’s communi-
cation Director by a much lower-profile figure, who subsequently avoided the
kinds of controversies which accompanied Campbell from 1994 to 2003.
Phillis’ interim report was published in August 2003, and confirmed the
widespread unease expressed by journalists, politicians and members of the
voting public as they viewed the development of government communi-
cations under New Labour. Citing research indicating a breakdown in trust
between politicians, media and public, Phillis argued that both politicians
and the media had to rethink their approach to political communication. In
the case of the latter, ‘the response to a rigorous and pro-active news manage-
ment strategy has been to match claim and counter-claim in a challenging
and adversarial way, making it difficult for any accurate communication of
real achievement to pass unchallenged’. 11 Echoing the criticisms of ‘hyper-
adversarial’ journalism coming from other quarters (Fallows, 1996) Phillis
urged the media ‘to recognise that their attitude and behaviour is a vital part
of the process’.
To the government, Phillis recommended greater clarity in the roles of
communication officials, and more transparency in the procedures governing

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