LONDON (Brand Republic) 鈥 The government has topped ad spending by consumer giants Unilever and Procter & Gamble to become the UK鈥檚 largest advertiser, according to new figures.
The government spent more than £16.4m on advertising in February -- more than £4m more than the second-largest advertiser Unilever, which spent £12.2m, while its rival Procter & Gamble clocked £10.1m in adspend, according to media monitoring service ACNielsen MMS.
The government鈥檚 main advertising activities in February were its campaign to encourage families to claim the new children鈥檚 tax credit, one to recruit more nurses and another urging people to plan pensions.
During the 12 months of 2000, the government ranked fourth by size of adspend -- below Unilever, P&G and BT. Since its election in 1997, the Labour government鈥檚 adspend has more than doubled, rising from £43.8m to £102.7m last year. Canada is the only other country with its government appearing among its top 10 advertisers.
The government has been criticised for using such mass advertising and the Conservatives have asked the Commons spending watchdogs to ensure advertising on government policies is not funding party propaganda. However, a Labour Party spokesman denied that taxpayers鈥 money was being used to promote the party鈥檚 policies in the run-up to the general election.
He added that each campaign had a legitimate purpose of informing the public, insisting that the money spent was a fraction of that available for distribution in the case of children鈥檚 tax credit.
However, campaigns such as the £15m Thora Hird campaign, created by BMP DDB, to encourage pensioners to claim more benefits have flopped, with only 60,000 replies generated out of a potential 500,000.
A poster campaign breaks this week, highlighting Labour鈥檚 achievements in the run-up to the election. It features a woman and child and the slogan 鈥淭he work goes on鈥, suggesting hard-working families have benefited under Labour.