It's a very strange feeling when the media monitoring tools you employ to check the coverage that your employer is getting, suddenly starts highlighting mentions of your own name.

Anyway, it seems I'm enjoying some mini-fame.

I've been mentioned on the Behind the Spin and the Leeds Met University websites.

Form an orderly queue for autographs please!

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

[Takes deep breath – long very non-plain English sentence coming up]

I’m led to believe that, once James Rogers had decided to (very kindly of course) offer me the job I had applied for at the council in 2007, the conversation with Councillor Andrew Carter, to inform him of my recruitment went something like:

James: “Councillor, we have hired someone to be our new communications manager for the press and media team.”

Cllr Carter: “Good, this is excellent news.”

James: “Yes, he’s well qualified and has the skills we need to do the job and I’m confident he’ll be able to help us get to where we want to be.”

Cllr Carter: “It sounds like you’ve got the right person.”

James: “Yes, I might add that he’s dashingly handsome and a rather jolly nice bloke too – but there’s a problem.”

Cllr Carter: “Oh No!  What problem?  Don’t tell me that he’s demanding £80,000 a year and for us to have him driven to the office each day?”

James: “Yes, he is, but there’s a bigger issue.  He’s called Andrew Carter.”

Cllr Carter: “Oh bugger.  He’ll have to change it to Andy if he wants the job.”

Right, OK, I admit that I might have done a little bit of teensy-weensy embellishing with that story, but the basic gist is roughly accurate.

As you can imagine, having the same name as the leader of the council has some distinct advantages as well as disadvantages.

I remember a few months back when I booked a room for a meeting.  Rather naughtily I didn’t challenge the person who was taking the booking when they wrote my name down as Andrew Carter!

However, I do get ‘mistaken’ for Cllr Carter quite a lot – people confuse us for each other despite our obvious differences in status and age!

Perhaps one of the strangest cases of ‘mistaken identity’ happened last week when I answered a call from a reporter.  It went like this:

[My phone rings]

Me: “Hello, communications, Andy speaking.”

Caller: ‘Gosh I’m surprised you answer your own phone.  Anyway, hello Andrew, my name is XXXX and I’m calling from XXXX.”

Me: “Hello.  What can I do to help?”

Caller: “You’ve been quoted in the paper talking about high speed rail and I wondered if I could come and interview you about it please?”

Me: “Umm, I’m sorry, but you must be mistaken, I’ve not been quoted in the paper.”

Caller: “Yes you have!!  I saw your name in the Yorkshire Evening Post – let me read it to you” [proceeds to read ‘my’ quote].

Me: “No, that’s not me.  I’m Andy Carter from the communications team.  The man you are talking about is Andrew Carter the leader of the council.”

Caller: “Oh, I see.  I did think it was odd that the leader of the council was in charge of communications and answered his own phone.”

Me: [sighs in desperation]

Right, onto other business.

Thanks for all your feedback from last week's log in which I once again lambasted the media for serious lack of effort and what I saw as further falling standards.

Here are some of the comments you sent me:

Deborah in the chief executive's office says: “On the BBC this morning, the newsreader, when commenting on a serious issue said ‘this is getting curiouser and curiouser.’  Great!  Auntie Beeb are now quoting Alice in Wonderland phrases consisting of made-up words in relation to serious kidnappings.  We are only a short step away from newsreaders saying ‘OMG’ (or, to quote Blackadder, ‘Hey Nonny Nonny’).”

Andy from the business transformation team sent this: “This week I am moved to respond, based on your comment regarding the failure of journalists to do more than 'Google reference' their work. I think that this seems to be part of a wider malaise in general broadcast media. It seems that stories have to fit easily into pre-defined narrative arcs if they stand any chance of being presented to the public - it seems we can't be trusted to form our own opinions if presented with balanced arguments, far better to package an opinion as fact.”
 
And as far as a potential council radio station is concerned, David in property maintenance at Seacroft emails: “What a great idea, a local government radio station could we call it ‘Smooth City Radio’ or ‘5 Star Radio’ based on what CPA rating we get.  Only trouble is the name would be constantly changing as the audit commission move the goal posts.”

And Josh, from south Leeds youth hub messaged to say: “Rather than create an isolated LCC radio station (let’s face it – who’s going to listen, and how exciting is it going to be?), why don’t you do it jointly with the local community?”

I’m shocked Josh – are you suggesting the joint Andy and Andrew Carter show on “Smooth City Five Star Leeds Radio” every weekday morning wouldn’t attract more listeners than BBC 3 does viewers?

Shame on you!

Given the fact I spend over 10 hours a week travelling to and from work by train, this article on the 'BBC magazine' website caught my eye.

The comments submitted by readers were also very funny.

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

I’m back from my little bit of leave – so firstly I must say thanks to Catherine for looking after the log in my absence.

Her entry was very interesting.

I suspect many of us don’t give the website much of a second thought – it’s just ‘there’ working away, doing its thing in the background.

However, as you will now know it’s actually a bit of a powerhouse and very important to us and the residents of Leeds.  In many ways, they have come to rely on some of the things it will actually do for them.

Regrettably, like an antique black and white TV, it might look good, but the technology behind it is on its last legs.

That’s why colleagues from my team are working on plans for a new site and what they need in terms of the infrastructure to run it.

Watch this space for more detail.  I’ll update you when there is more news.

Thanks also for your contributions and comments to my last log – the one where I was talking about the Independent’s front page story about job ‘losses’ and what I considered to be its serious lack of fact-checking.

Many of you pointed to Google News as a source for the supposed 650 posts ‘being axed’ and some of you said a search of our press release database from 2009 revealed the figure from one of our own statements.

That may be true – but I am disappointed in you.

Only one person who pointed me to a search page finished their email message with the words “… but it’s a shame the reporter just relied on Google.”

Exactly.  That was the whole point I was trying to make.

It is completely unacceptable that a journalist does a quick search on Google (other search engines are available!) and then prints whatever they find without checking with us first.

Now – I may be jumping to conclusions here dearest and loyal readers, but the fact that only one of you thought it important to highlight their concern about the use of Google as their primary source – worries me.

Does that mean you think this is acceptable, common or inevitable practice?

If so, then my depression about the state of current journalism in the UK just cranked up another notch.  Maybe I’ve got that wrong and no doubt you will be straight onto Outlook to send me your thoughts.

As ever they are more than welcome!

Of course, having been away from the office for over a week, I’ve missed lots of the exciting things that have been going on.

My team assures me that they did do some work and I can’t find any empty packets of Custard Creams (although someone did buy some mini flapjacks) which disproves their claims.

So, I thought I’d end on a ‘personal’ note.

During my 10 days of leave I went back to my old college to present a lecture to 50 or so communications and media students.  It was also an opportunity to meet up with my former radio colleague Mary Stanley whom I haven’t seen for 12 years.  She and I worked together at a radio station on the south coast before she eventually was drawn to the bright lights of TV news and got herself on the tele.

We spent nearly two hours reminiscing about ‘the good old days’.

Mary is convinced that my time in public sector communications is limited and that I will “return to broadcasting one day”.

It took almost all of my energy to persuade her that I seriously doubt it.  The broadcasting sector in the UK is not a patch on what it was when I first started, the money is terrible and the resources available in the commercial sector at least are woefully inadequate.

Besides, the challenge of working for the public sector at such an interesting time and being in a fantastic city like Leeds is much more attractive right now.

Well, at least that’s what I thought until I was clearing out the loft last week.

I found a box full of old photographs of me during my radio career.  There was one of me doing my first live broadcast from Stonehenge in Wiltshire and several of me at the station I ran on the Isle of Wight.

The memories came flooding back and I did wonder what I might be doing now if I was still working in radio.

Then I had an idea.  To combine my love of public sector communications and my passion for broadcasting perhaps I should … set up a council radio station!

There’s plenty of talent in the organisation and each ‘presenter’ would only have to fill an hour-long slot.  Of course, the breakfast show would be the most prestigious programme and we’d need a ‘big name’ member of staff to take on the likes of Messers Evans and Moyles.

As a bit of fun email me your suggestions.

Then of course there’s the name for our new radio station.  I thought “Leeds Radio” – that would cause a stir among a certain group of people!

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

There are several things I want to ponder this week.

Firstly, lots of news organisations pride themselves on the ‘speed and accuracy’ of their journalism – in fact that’s the central mission statement of BBC News, which of course also includes the word ‘impartiality’.

But it seems the ethos of accuracy certainly isn’t alive at the Independent newspaper.  My colleague spotted its very interesting front-page lead story last week which declared that 20,000 public sector jobs were going.

The article highlighted Leeds City Council as one of the local authorities which was supposedly cutting 650 jobs.  It also talked about Birmingham, which of course was in the news earlier this month over its plans to lose 2000 workers.

We were very alarmed about this news – mainly because it was the first we’d heard of it.  Up to that point we certainly weren’t aware of plans to cut any jobs at Leeds.  We racked our brains about this.  Was the figure in an executive board report that we hadn’t read?  Was someone on ‘the inside’ briefing the newspaper about our jobs situation?  Clearly, the Independent had good sources.

Umm, well actually no.  It didn’t.  It seems the paper just made up the figure.

Yep, you heard right.  Made.  It.  Up.  And, in doing so, gave no regard to the consequences of any one of us reading this on the way to work.

The reason we’ve arrived at this conclusion is because there is no record of the paper having contacted our press office to check the facts.  You won’t be surprised to learn that we log every query we deal with and having checked our records, no call was ever made to us.

Of course, it goes without saying that we rang the paper to discuss this apparent inaccuracy with them.  My colleague, who put in the call, tells me that they’ve not been able to explain the 650 figure that they’ve quoted and so far the reporter concerned has not returned our call.  No surprise there then.

Leading on from that, our colleague David Reid from regeneration services is rather concerned about comments made by the MP Sir Nicholas Winterton in the last few days.  Mr Winterton was complaining that members of parliament ‘weren’t allowed to travel first class any longer’.  His comments made many news bulletins and filled a number of column inches.  He highlighted the fact that ‘local councillors and local council officers travelled first class’.

David – like most of us – knows this isn’t true and – like most of us – is annoyed that many news outlets reported this inaccuracy as a matter of fact.

Yet another example, perhaps, where someone goes unchallenged and an untruth ‘becomes’ a truth because of the media failing to do its job properly.  This is exactly the point Nick Davies makes in his book ‘Flat Earth News’.

In ‘other news’ this week, it seems there is now a realisation across public sector communications professionals that we need to be a bit more joined up in future.

My colleague Ann Clayton, who’s the director of communications at West Yorkshire Police, is going to chair a meeting involving all five West Yorkshire local authorities, the fire and rescue and ambulance service about whether, and how, we should pool our resources and expertise.

It makes perfect sense and I’m excited by the opportunities that this could present.  At the same time, I acknowledge there are some significant challenges to overcome as well – but that’s no reason not to try.

Frankly we need to be brave.  And radical too perhaps.

The same applies to our own organisation.  I took part in a really interesting workshop yesterday to look at what common processes the council has (admin, data capture, workforce planning, financial management systems etc).

The project is called DECATS and it’s all about getting rid of unnecessary duplication, therefore streamlining the way we work.

We all had to come up with our own ideas for streamlining or a process we’d change.  It’s perhaps no surprise that several people had similar ideas and that common themes developed.

One was about how we record and then use information and data, another was getting rid of the internal charges system and a third was around what functions could be rationalised or merged into a single team.

All great ideas and I imagine there is merit in many of them.

The danger is that we don’t do anything about it or with them.  Yes, I can see that there are challenges ahead, some tough decisions would have to be taken and some difficult conversations would have to be had.

However – we cannot do nothing.

We need to be brave in our decision making and we also need to be a bit radical in our thinking across the whole of the public sector.  It would be a crying shame if in two years time I get called to another workshop and we say exactly the same things as we did yesterday.

Finally, I’m returning to my old college on Thursday to do a lecture to 100 or so communications, media and business students about my transition from the light to the dark side (you know, journalism to PR).  I’m combining it with some leave so I can see my mum and sister too.

It means I won’t be here next week – so I’m handing the Log over to my colleague Catherine Gray who’ll be writing the weekly entry on my behalf.

Be gentle with her please.

[Right Scotty, fire up the warp drives and get me to Winchester pronto please …]

I’ve long agreed with people who’ve argued there’s a clear need for the ‘fashion police’ who would cart you off to jail for having bad dress sense or awful hair.

As I spend more than 10 hours a week travelling on public transport (which attracts more than its fair share of weirdos) I can see their point.

There are plenty of people who seem to suffer form serious ‘wardrobe malfunctions’ on Transpennine Express. Anyone would think Geordie Jeans are back in fashion. They aren’t of course (and I wonder if they ever were).

Having said all of that, if there were such a thing as the fashion police then First Transpennine Express would go out of business as large number of its passengers would be arrested.

Anyway – now I can see there’s a definite need for a third tier of law enforcement … the technology police!

There should be people in uniform who patrol to make sure that no-one is using outdated tech. Any device that’s more than five years out of date would be confiscated and the owner chucked in the slammer.

I say this because I have a first offender.

He’s the man who has spent the whole journey from Northallerton to Leeds so far chattering into his Dictaphone and then listening back to his own voice. To make matters worse he appears to have a Minidisc player and an old Nokia 3510 phone with him as well.

I just hope that Sergeant Scary from the Technology Police gets on at Garforth.

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

I know I often use my Log to ask for your help and today is no exception.

In May, about 400 or so communications people from across local government and the public sector will be in Leeds for a national conference.  We ‘bid’ to be host city last year for the event, which is run by LG Communications.

My team and I are really excited and we’ve built up a bit of a reputation for being the most accommodating host city so far.  We done everything we can to help the organisers, including a very generous offer from Conference Leeds to sponsor one of the evening gatherings when delegates can do some ‘networking’.

The three-day conference also includes an awards night and for this, the Victoria Hall in the Town Hall has been booked.  Clearly it’s a fantastic venue and the awards are billed as ‘the Oscars of the local government communications world’ so it should be a pretty prestigious occasion.

This story has been emailed to me by a former colleague at the BBC.

The Government could save billions of pounds by scrapping a flagship programme to assess and publicise the performance of local services, a
think-tank report said today.

The Comprehensive Area Assessment (CAA), launched last year, brings together reports from six inspectorates to provide an overview of local
services on the Oneplace website.

But the Localis think-tank said the system has induced a "culture of compliance" among councils and failed to improve the performance of
local government.

Councils should be allowed to opt out of the CAA system and set their own performance measures, assisted by more local accountability and peer
support, said the report.

In return, councils should be required to release more data, making public details of all spending over GBP500 as well as information about
councillors - including their attendance and voting records and declared interests.

The report called for the scrapping of 25 indicators currently measured by the CAA process, along with a "rigorous check" on the remaining
measures.

Any increase in local accountability must be tempered by an increase in power from central to local government, it said.

Localis said that the cost of CAA compliance alone is currently GBP2 billion, but suggested that savings could be far higher when the costs
of distortions created by the system are taken into account.

The think-tank's chief executive, James Morris, said: "Local authorities are more accountable to central government than to their residents.
Without doubt this has been a contributing factor in the disengagement of local people.

"The new system we propose can turn this underwhelming system of performance and assessment on its head."

The report's author, Tom Shakespeare, added: "The need for local government to be freed from central targets has never been greater. Now
is the perfect time to re-think how to radically improve the public sector, improving performance and saving significant sums of money in
the process."

Hmm, sounds reasonable to me ...

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

Firstly this week – a ‘shout out’ to my new found councillor friends on the central and corporate scrutiny board, which I had to go and speak in front of yesterday.

I was ‘appearing’ to give an update on where we are with the plain English campaign we’re running.  You know, I’ve talked about it before in my Log.

The councillors were pleased with the progress we’ve made and very supportive of what we’re doing, which is fantastic.  They were particularly impressed that 400 odd members of staff are now on the list to join the workshops.

I’ve invited every single member of the board to join in too and within a few minutes of the meeting finishing, one had already put their name down.

Yet again, Yorkshire Evening Post reporter Dave Marsh was in the room to listen to the discussions.  I used the opportunity to publically thank him for the article he ran last year about our plain English aspirations.

He tells me he’s going to run something new about how we’re getting on.

Thanks also to you – there was only one person in the public seating area of the committee room and no rotten fruit was thrown which made the whole ‘going before the committee’ experience so much better.

Next – we’re being asked for help by a student from Leeds Met University.

Last year I did a guest lecture at the Rose Bowl to students from the uni’s PR and business school and since then we’d had loads of requests for us to assist with dissertations and various studies that they are doing.

One of the students is Jenny Singh.  Here’s what she’s sent me:

I am currently studying Public Relations in my final year at Leeds Metropolitan University. As part of my final year I am required to complete a dissertation, which includes conducting research. The link below will direct you to an online survey, this survey is designed for the purpose of my dissertation only and I would really appreciate it if you, and your colleagues, would take a few minutes to complete it. The survey is completely anonymous and all information collated will remain confidential.  The survey is here:

http://FreeOnlineSurveys.com/rendersurvey.asp?sid=tt7qfuprxx1865i699778

If you were able to find time to help her out, I know she would be very grateful.

Finally, I’m handing over the Log for a ‘guest editor’ to finish off this week.  Mark Travis my colleague who is in charge of the About Leeds newspaper, so it’s fitting that he’s here to talk about a new report from the Audit Commission which finds that council publications aren’t killing off the local newspaper industry after all.

There was quite a hoo-ha in the press last week about council newspapers.

Yes, again.  But, please, don’t stop reading. There’s a twist.

To recap, paid-for newspapers hate council publications, like our very own About Leeds.

So when the government’s Lord Carter called in the Audit Commission to review the town hall freesheets, Her Majesty’s hacks started sharpening their knives.

What they got left ‘em livid.

The Audit Commission not only likes council newspapers, it encourages them.  The commission finds council newspapers ‘important to inform the public of services … and explain policies and priorities’.  And, according to the government body, the money being spent ‘is not unreasonable’, while ‘few publications are published sufficiently to be viable media for most local advertising’.

Looking at their  findings and recommendations, About Leeds seemingly comes out of this pretty well.  For frequency, we are pretty common as 38 per cent publish four times per year.  About Leeds is also among the 26 per cent that does not feature councillors in any form.

In fact, out of the 120 councils the Audit Commission reviewed, only one council newspaper was overseen by a cross-party editorial board. Presumably, About Leeds.

One Audit Commission criticism did, however, centre on claims about value for money being ‘not well supported generally’.

I think we can contest this.  In 2009, About Leeds went under the public microscope for both the readers and residents surveys, which quizzed around 2,700 Leeds residents in total.

In response to the Audit Commission’s findings, the press and the industry’s commentators were apoplectic.

Again, they cried foul over taxpayer cost saying councils should instead plough money into their newspapers’ advertising to plug their plummeting income.

That’s a pretty unique mix of free market policy matched with a healthy dose of protectionism.

In general, it doesn’t really wash.

About Leeds isn’t perfect. But it isn’t Pravda either.

If it was, it wouldn’t be dubbed the best newspaper in the north, as it is currently.

Who says so? Commercial newspaper editors, who made up a panel of judges at the last Communicators in Business North Awards.

And who finished runners-up to About Leeds? A pretty major newspaper publishing company’s staff newspaper, produced by journos for journos.

Gotcha!