Forum Topic

Have I Wandered into Stalinist Russia?

After a long absence I visited in King Street in Hammersmith recently. It was a slightly surreal experience as the whole place just felt wrong. The streets were lined with banners extolling the virtues of the glorious leadership of Hammersmith and Fulham Council with a list of their fantastic achievements.There was something distinctly unBritish about this and it seems to assume a collective stupidity amongst local residents. Surely the response of every taxpayer in the borough will not be 'oh look aren't the Council marvellous' but ' why on earth are these jokers wasting my money on propaganda'.I'm not a resident and my own Council uses banners on lampposts to promote bipartisan campaigns such as a Spend Local initiative currently. This self-puffery by LBHF seems particularly outrageous in an election year and I'm amazed it is both legal and tolerated by residents.Does anybody on this board think that it is anything but unacceptable?

Andy Jones ● 5548d5 Comments

Now all the lampposts are displaying ads for an anti-smoking campaign. Somebody must have had a word.

Ellen Kearney ● 5532d

Must admit have not taken much notice of them.  Having said that if you take a look at the front page of the Chiswick site you will see that there is an article on their re waste of council tax payers money in respect of councils self promotion.  Seems like LBH&F are not the only borough to do such things.

Carol Burge ● 5533d

It's a good question. The most effective form of propaganda is a lower Council Tax bill which H&F have delivered for several years now with little apparent impact on services. This can only mean there was substantial overspend by the previous administration. The on-street glorification of their achievements is hopefully counter-productive but probably not enough to lose them the election.

Andy Jones ● 5547d

Who exactly do you think you are going to be voting out of office?  LB Hammersmith and Fulham is run by the Tories - not Labour or are you saying that you are going to vote Labour?

Tina Pemberton ● 5548d

Looking forward to voting them out of office in May in the hope that the next bunch won't waste our money on such nonsense. I can see no justification for the banners whatsoever - likewise their dreadful 'newspaper'.

Lina Leaman ● 5548d