Fleishman-Hillard

This article is part of the Foodspin project of Spinwatch.

This article is part of the Lobbying Portal, a sunlight project from Spinwatch.

This article is part of the Nuclear Spin project of Spinwatch.

Fleishman Hillard London Office above Covent Garden tube station

Fleishman-Hillard is one of the biggest PR companies in the world. Its parent company is the Omnicom group Inc, which is a huge conglomerate that describes itself as a "global leader in Marketing and Global Communications". It has absorbed the group of firms formerly trading under the name GPC International.

Global operation

Headquartered in St. Louis, Fleishman-Hillard has over 80 offices throughout North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East, South Africa, and Latin America. It operates through a variety of networks:

• Allyn & Company
• Fleishman-Hillard Government Relations
• GPC Public Affairs
• GMMB
• Mercury Public Affairs
• Strat@comm
• VOX Global Mandate

UK operation

Fleishman-Hillard has 3 offices in the UK and Ireland: London, Fleishman-Hillard (Edinburgh) and Dublin. Services include keeping clients up to speed on all things political. For example, in 2005 F-H distributed a glossy brochure to their clients sketching the likely changes that could be expected under a Labour government led by Gordon Brown. Kevin Maguire wrote in the New Statesman in April 2005: "Warning multinational bosses that the next Labour premier's philosophy is built on - wait for it - equity, the booklet predicts Brown will centralise power around himself".

People

• Kevin Bell, Executive Vice President and Senior Partner (UK and South Africa). Bell is described as one of the "great and the good” in the PR industry. He is a former advisor to Margaret Thatcher "Managing a team of 150-plus consultants in Fleishman-Hillard's London, Edinburgh and Johannesburg offices, Kevin specialises in advising senior executives of leading blue-chip companies, as well as senior politicians on their communications strategies." He is the ex-Founding Director of Westminster Strategy, established Lowe Bell Political (later Bell Pottinger Public Affairs) in 1994, and joined GPC International UK in 2000. He is a trustee of the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA).
• Nick Williams, head of public affairs. Williams was an advisor to the Labour Party from 1993-97, and part of Tony Blair's team during the 2001 and 2005 general elections.
• Simon Benson, lobbyist. Benson was a special adviser to Home Secretary Jacqui Smith while she was chief whip from May 2006 to June 2007. Before that, Benson was a special adviser to the previous chief whip Hilary Armstrong.
• Sophie Pim, lobbyist. Pim was David Cameron's former operations manager, who is described as bringing “first hand experience of the inner workings of the Cameron team.”
• Paul Borge, head of digital. F-H was bought in to support David Davis' by-election fight following his resignation in summer 2008 from the Conservative Party front bench over the government's plans to extend detention to 42 days. Kevin Bell said the agency's digital team had been involved in the design of Davis' website, adding that he has known Davis for 20 years. Bell said he would not rule out providing further PR support should Davis need it.

UK lobbying clients

F-H lists its UK lobbying clients as: Abbott UK | Alliance of Sector Skills Councils | Annington Homes | American Pharmaceutical Group | ASH Scotland | AT&T | British Insurance Brokers Association | Brookfield Real Estate Services | Cayman Islands Government | Coloplast | Crucell | DHL | Dollar Financial | Edinburgh Military Tattoo | Emerson | Genzyme | HBOS | InBev | InterGen | International Paper | Ixion | Marks & Spencer plc | Merck Schering Plough | National Air Traffic Services | News International | NHS Supply Chain | Omnicom | Oxford Nanopore | Provident Financial | Research In Motion | Rio Tinto Alcan | RPSGB | Scottish Development International | ScottishPower | Scottish Water | TalentScotland | TCS | United Utilities | UK Young Scientists & Engineers Fair | VAT Liaison | World Hepatitis Alliance | Wyeth | Equifax | Fellowes | Flybe | Royal Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland

Scottish operation

The Fleishman-Hillard office in Edinburgh was originally set up as GPC in 1996 ahead of the establishment of a Scottish Parliament in 1999.

They boast that "Within Scotland, we are unrivalled in the depth and breadth of our knowledge on the detail of devolution and how the Scottish Parliament really operates in practice". They go on to say:

"We pride ourselves on our understanding of how the Scottish political, policy, and media agendas impacts the rest of the United Kingdom and companies and organisations and their businesses. We can make a difference to our clients' business objectives by combining the right resources, people, and skills with a clear perspective and an innovative approach to any communications challenge".

They conclude by stating:

"Our team is drawn from a range of career backgrounds, bringing together political experience, policy development insight, strategic communications, event management, and research skills. The common factors among the team are our commitment to our clients and assurance that we will keep their needs at the top of our agenda".

And finally: "To make ourselves as valuable to our clients as they are to us."

One service they provide for their clients is to attend Scottish parliament cross-party group meetings that may affect their clients. For example, the cross-party Food group was attended by two employees, Jenni Wilkie and Ben Bosely Walker, in February of 2005. This may have something to do with Tesco being a client of theirs.

See

Another client is Pfizer and therefore it comes as no surprise that Rachel Roberston (see below) is on the Cross Party Group for Diabetes, although she is listed as working for GPC, rather than Fleishman-Hillard.

An employee of GPC, Ben Collins is also listed as being a member of the Oil group, with still no update ackowledging the change of name and ownership to Fleishman-Hillard. While finally Jenni Wilkie is listed as being a member of the Tackling Debt group, but yet again as being an employee of GPC and not of Fleishman Hillard.

Specific lobbying campaigns

Nuclear

Fleishman-Hillard has for several years handled the bulk of Nirex’s (Nuclear Industry Radioactive Waste Executive) monitoring service. One service the PR company provides is to attend Scottish parliament cross-party group meetings that may affect their clients. One of the PR company’s Scottish employees, Rachel Robertson, used to be on the Cross Party Group on the Civil Nuclear Industry. She attended these meetings listed as being from Nirex, and not as an employee from Fleishman-Hillard. Robertson has since been replaced by Ian Price who was also listed as being from Nirex. Coincidentally there was also an Ian Price listed as working at Fleishman-Hillard's Edinburgh office.

Biotech

In 2003, it was reported that “Fleishman-Hillard has been getting more and more deeply involved in the biotechnology sector, helping the Biotechnology Industry Organisation and the Council of Biotechnology Information communicate the benefits of the technology to consumers and opinion leaders.” In April 2006, US biotechnology firm Genzyme appointed Fleishman-Hillard to boost its profile among British policymakers and lobby the UK Government to commit more funding to biotech.;

Turkey

On 10 October 2007, the US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs passed Resolution 106, which accuses the Turkish rulers in 1915 of genocide. There was an intensive on behalf of the Turkish government to sway the committee, described by Ali H. Aslan as follows:

Both the Turkish and the US governments strongly opposed the resolution and were joined by DLA Piper, the Livingstone Group, public relations company Fleishman-Hillard and other companies that officially conducted lobbying activities on behalf of Turkey as well as by big corporations that have sizable commercial deals with Turkey such as Boeing and BP.

ID cards

In June 2005, Kevin Bell from the UK arm of Fleishman-Hillard spoke at a one-day conference in London called ID Cards: Towards Procurement and Implementation. The title of his talk was "Achieving public acceptance".

Controversy in the US

In May 2006, two senior Fleishman-Hillard executives Doug Dowie and John Stodder were found guilty in a fraud trial that had gripped the US PR industry for two years. The jury found Dowie guilty on 14 counts of 'wire fraud' and one count of conspiracy - in a scheme to overbill city tax-payers for PR services. Stodder, the agency's one-time SV-P of PA, was convicted on 11 counts of wire fraud and one on conspiracy. The two had been charged with conspiracy and wire fraud in an alleged 2003 scam to defraud the Department of Water and Power out of more than dollars 300,000.

Contacts

UK 40 Long Acre, London WC2
http://www.fleishman-hillard.co.uk

Global website
http://www.fleishman.com

External Links

• GPC International UK Staff and Clients 1.12.03 to 31.5.04
• Fleishman-Hillard UK Staff and Clients 31.11.04 to 31.5.05
• Fleishman-Hillard, PRCA Yearbook 2004
• Fleishman-Hillard UK Staff and Clients 1 June 2005 to 30 Nov 2005
• Fleishman-Hillard UK Staff and Clients 1 December 2007 to 29 February 2008

Resources

For further information, see relevant SourceWatch page Fleishman-Hillard