Page 176 - An Introduction to Political Communication Third Edition

POLITICAL PUBLIC RELATIONS

second term, his government was required to trim some of the
excesses of its communication apparatus and be more discrete in its
use of media management and political communication techniques.
New Labour’s 2001 election campaign accordingly emphasised
delivery over spin and substance over style.
The Conservatives for their part have also had problems with
internal communication. Despite the success of its political
marketing since the mid-1970s, the party found itself in some
difficulty in the 1987 campaign. Confronted on the one hand by an
unprecedentedly professional Labour campaign, on the other their
own efforts were hampered by a lack of co-ordination between key
elements of the communications apparatus. Mrs Thatcher made a
number of ‘gaffes’ during the campaign including, on Labour’s
‘health day’, her insistence on her moral right to attend a private
hospital. Tory difficulties culminated in ‘wobbly Thursday’, when it
began to seem that Labour might win the election. In the end, Tory
fears were misplaced and Mrs Thatcher achieved a third election
victory with an overall majority in three figures. Nevertheless, the
party leadership’s dissatisfaction with what it perceived to be
a weak campaign led to a restructuring of the public relations
organisation.
Party chairman Peter Brooke divided Central Office functions
into three – communication, research and organisation – and
appointed Brendan Bruce as Director of Communications. A
communication audit conducted by Shandwick PR in 1991 led to
the appointment of regional communications officers to liaise with
the local media in their areas. In 1991 too, after a period of cool
relations, the Conservatives reappointed Saatchi and Saatchi to plan
and co-ordinate communications strategy in all its aspects. The
agency developed a ‘long’ campaign, stressing the Tories’ economic
competence and raising anxieties about Labour’s ‘tax and spend’
plans. ‘The government was urged to seize the opportunity to
dominate the news, exploiting ministerial statements, parlia-
mentary questions, control of parliamentary time, and, ultimately,
the Budget’ (Butler and Kavanagh, 1992, p. 81).
The ‘short’ campaign, when it came, was generally perceived as
being much more successful than that of 1987 (although in the
election itself the government’s majority was cut to 22). In 1992,
unlike 1987,

10 Downing Street was to be intimately linked with
operations in Central Office and there would be close

155