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One thing is clear... hardly anyone understands these useless council publications
EXCLUSIVE: A Yorkshire council has admitted that only 16 per cent of the 250 glossy publications it turns out every year are understood by residents.
More: Neighbouring Kirklees Council criticised for gobbledegook in 119,000 job ad
Calderdale's annual statement of accounts shows it spends 600,000 on publicity but according to its head of communications, Louise Tonkinson, "of the 250 publications the council produces each year approximately only 16 per cent are understandable and useful to our average resident.''
Commenting on the quality of design and print she added: "Many of the publications reviewed are produced on a PC and printed using standard council printing equipment.
"Worse still, 10 per cent of our publications were poor photocopies of an original document. The resulting documents look very 'homemade' and do not present the council in a professional light...''
Ms Tonkinson also criticised the quality of the photographs used and the lack of branding as "24 per cent of publications audited didn't include the council logo on the front cover.''
It was no better when it came to environmental impact – "91 per cent of publications made no reference to being produced on recycled paper...''
Blind residents were unlikely to get much help from many of the publications with 21 per cent failing to reach Royal National Institute standards on type size. "Only 20 per cent offered large print, Braille or other formats.''
Coun Paul Rogan, (English Democrats, Rastrick), said: "It sounds like Calderdale has been operating its publishing business like a John Bull printing press," and added that it should not be trying to compete with councils the size of Leeds and Manchester.
Leader of the council's Lib Dems, Janet Battye, said Calderdale did not score at all highly in customer satisfaction surveys.
Calderdale Cabinet member Coun Craig Whittaker: "It's appalling but I am not surprised. We don't score well in customer satisfaction surveys and we need to do a lot better than this.''
The report will be discussed by Calderdale's corporate services scrutiny panel tomorrow.
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Sunday 12 February 2012
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