The government's Advisory Committee on Advertising (ACA), whose members include Sainsbury's assistant managing director Sara Weller and Thames Water worldwide director of marketing and strategy Mike Moran, is close to completing an audit of the DfT's decision to set up its own creative and media agency rosters.
And sources close to ACA have told Marketing that the outcome of the audit will be 'favourable' to the COI and will leave the Cabinet Office, to which ACA reports, in no doubt that the DfT should return to using the COI to procure its marketing services.
One source said a meeting last month between ACA and Media Audits, which looked at a range of government advertising campaigns - including those run by the DfT - concluded that COI-procured campaigns were more cost-effective over a longer period.
ACA will also suggest that it makes sense for DfT to return to the COI from the perspective of providing "joined-up communications" that prevent money being wasted by separate Whitehall departments on similar campaigns.
The Cabinet Office is unlikely to reject ACA's recommendations after promising the committee a beefed-up role following the resignation of its chairman Derek Dear. Several ACA members were furious that the DfT appointed six creative agencies already on the COI roster.
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