Pickles serves direction requiring Greenwich to stop publishing weekly newsletter

The Royal Borough of Greenwich has been served with a direction requiring it to comply with the Code of Recommended Practice on Local Authority Publicity and cease publishing its weekly newsletter.

In a written statement to Parliament, Kris Hopkins, a minister at the Department for Communities and Local Government, said the notice – issued by Secretary of State Eric Pickles under section 4a of the Local Government Act – required Greenwich to:

• commission or publish no more than four issues of Greenwich Time, or any equivalent newsletter, newssheet or similar communication, in the period of one year commencing 31 March 2015, and in subsequent years; and
• ensure that the executive of the council within 14 days of the date of the direction will take the necessary decisions in order that the council will be in a position to comply with the requirement on publication from 31 March 2015 onwards.

The DCLG said the direction meant Greenwich was “also barred from outsourcing or contracting for the publication of any weekly newsletter, newssheet or similar communication by a third party to whom the council may make payment”.

Greenwich was one of 11 local authorities to be warned in September last year of legal action if it failed to stop or justify actions considered not to be in compliance with the code, which restricts the frequency of publication of a council’s newspaper.

After receiving a notice from the DCLG warning of a proposed direction, Greenwich argued that there was no evidence that its weekly newspaper had an impact on the local independent press in its area.

The authority also argued that the direction would be ultra vires, irrational, and procedurally unfair, and that in any event the council would not be able to comply with such a direction by the proposed date of 31 March 2015.

Hopkins told Parliament that the Secretary of State had “carefully considered” these representations, together with other information available about the council’s publicity, the responses received to the Government’s 2013 Protecting the independent press from unfair competition consultation, and the Government’s response to that consultation.

“He has also had careful regard to the [DCLG’s] equality statement on enforcing the code of recommended practice on local authority publicity, and has considered afresh earlier representations that the council had made about proposals to direct its compliance with the code to restrict the frequency of publication of its newspaper,” Hopkins said.

The Secretary of State had gone on to conclude that “it would be lawful and appropriate in all the circumstances of Greenwich for him now to issue the direction as he had proposed”.

A Royal Borough of Greenwich spokesperson said: “We have received a direction from the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government in respect of our residents' newspaper, Greenwich Time. A report on the matter will be considered at the next meeting of the Council's Cabinet.

"We note that the Royal Borough of Greenwich is the only authority to be directed on this issue; this is despite a strong case presented by the Royal Borough in response to previous letters from the Secretary of State.”