Hard to believe that more than a year has passed since the first Gomery report into Ottawa’s advertising and promotional practices was unleashed, precipitating an early election and then a change in government. I still find it astonishing that advertising patronage, something that had been accepted as “just the way it is” in political circles and the ad industry for generations, could somehow bring a government down. No matter, there are tough new rules and processes in place for the procurement of almost all forms of marketing communications services. And regardless of whether you believe-as many in the industry do-these rules are too onerous and too fixated on price, there’s no question the system is more transparent and the playing field more level.
Note, however, the “almost” in that last statement. There is still a gaping hole in the federal reform of its marcom services management: None of the new rules apply to public relations. In fact, as Luc Beauregard-the man leading the charge to change that on behalf of the Canadian Public Relations Society-notes, there are no centralized controls and standards for PR services by federal departments or Crown corporations. Ottawa, in fact, has no idea how much it spends annually on PR, let alone any standards to ensure that it’s being bought in an above-board manner, or if value for money is being achieved.
On one level this is very odd when you consider that the one guy who’s done serious jail time over Adscam, Paul Coffin, was actually always more of a PR guy than an adman. But on another level, you can understand why PR might get quietly left out of the new rules. Much, although by no means all, of the work consists of small budget assignments that are short term and tactical in nature. Everywhere, not just in Ottawa, PR is still one of the most intangible and least understood of the marcom services. And, let’s be blunt, it is the most obvious sector where partisan political operatives can hang up their own shingles and still be as seamlessly available to political masters as they might be on ministerial staffs.
Beauregard, CEO and chair of the country’s largest PR firm, Montreal-based National Public Relations, makes no bones that there’s historically been a lot of partisan politics at play in the awarding of not just the small stuff but also Ottawa’s biggest PR contracts. Over its 30 years, National has been all but shut out of federal work; told by the Mulroney Tories that his firm was too Liberal and told by the Chrétien Liberals that it was too aligned with the Conservatives to be in either “club.” For the record, Beauregard maintains that National, while staunchly federalist-he was wearing his Order of Canada pin when I met him for lunch recently-has always been nonaligned (although you can see how handling Mulroney’s image management during the Airbus affair, as a paid job, might not endear National to the Chrétien crew). And he’s realistic enough to concede that any reform would have to leave ministers the discretion to give some smaller, politically sensitive PR jobs to partisan allies.
Beauregard has personally brought his concerns about government PR to every new minister of Public Works for a couple of decades now. There have been quite a few of them in recent years. Sensing a window of opportunity, CPRS formally backed Beauregard’s latest efforts this spring, giving them added heft. He told Marketing‘s Montreal correspondent, Danny Kucharsky, in October (Marketing Daily, Oct. 17) that there’s probably never been a better chance of serious change than right now under the Harper government.
Big progress was made in May when, as part of the Federal Accountability Act, Public Works and Government Services Minister Michael Fortier said PR would be separated from advertising RFPs. At least now, PR won’t just be an afterthought that gets subcontracted by ad shops.
Public Works confirms it has held consultations on how to handle PR. But, really, what’s to consult about? PR is the last messy detail in the Gomery-era of reforms. Let’s just get on with it and apply all the rules to all services.
