Page 143 - An Introduction to Political Communication Third Edition

COMMUNICATING POLITICS

find out what is most likely to affect them. That is the process we
went through with the GLC, as we would with Cadbury’s, Courage
or the Guardian [all of whom BMP had worked for]. It’s the same
process’ (quoted in Myers, 1986, p. 111).
BMP’s market research established that Londoners were not
especially concerned with the survival of the GLC as an institution
in itself, but were concerned about losing their right to vote for local
government, which was one obvious consequence of the GLC’s
abolition. In the light of their findings, and to maximise support
amongst predominantly pro-Tory voters for an organisation run by
the Labour Left, BMP developed a dual strategy of, first, informing
Londoners about the basic public service (and largely apolitical)
activities of the GLC, such as running a cheap and efficient mass
transport network. Second, they sought to combat the Tory
government’s (and its supporters in the press) demonisation of the
GLC and Ken Livingstone in particular. The resulting advertise-
ments were of two basic types: those dealing with the issue of the
GLC were in black and white, connoting ‘seriousness’; those
tackling the demonisation of the Left were humorous and mocking
of the government.
Although the GLC campaign was unable to prevent the powerful
Tory government from proceeding with its abolition legislation,
opinion polls indicated that, by its end, a majority of Londoners –
including those who would declare themselves to be Conservative
voters – favoured the continuation of the GLC and opposed
government policy on this issue. The campaign consequently ‘won
plaudits for BMP throughout the advertising world and grudging
admiration from Livingstone’s opponents in the political world’
(Hughes and Wintour, 1993, p. 55). It also showed, in the view of
Labour’s media adviser Philip Gould, that ‘sophisticated communi-
cation techniques, and in particular advertising, can be used by a
radical organisation without compromising either the message, or
the policies underlying [it]’ (ibid.).
So successful was the campaign perceived to be, by friends and
enemies of the Livingstone-led GLC alike, that the government later
introduced measures to prevent a repetition of it in future struggles
with local government, of which, in the era of poll tax and rate-
capping, there were to be many, and not just with Labour-
controlled authorities. The Local Government Act of 1986 declared
that henceforth ‘a local authority shall not publish any material
which in whole or in part, appears to be designed to affect, or can
reasonably be regarded as likely to affect, public support for (a) a

122