Council's £1m bill for spin doctors

Tax payers are footing an annual bill of nearly £1 million for Staffordshire County Council's publicity team, it has been revealed.

There are 21 full time and two part time staff in the county council's communications team. There is also one full time vacancy.

Council leader Councillor John Taylor told a meeting of the council yesterday that the annual salary bill for the publicity and public relations operation is £958,986.

The figures came in response to a question from Tory Councillor Henry Butter to the leader of the Labour-controlled council.

And the leader of the opposition Conservatives, Councillor Philip Atkins, said that the cost of the council's public relations would be urgently reviewed if his party won control in June's county elections.

"Nearly £1 million is being spent on spin. There are some things that need to be communicated, but this is an awful lot of money for the type of stuff that is being pushed out," he said. "It needs to be better focused and not just the county council saying how good it is."

Councillor Taylor said that an Audit Commission assessment in 2006 had recommended improvements to external communications and the corporate communications function had been restructured.

"Since then performance has improve significantly and various new initiatives have been put in place to better inform the public," he said.

The head of the communications team Jackie McGinley was not prepared to comment further.