Cost of sponsorship promotion queried

Press, 10 July 1987, Page 7

Cost of sponsorship promotion queried

Among the questions asked in yesterday’s "post-mortem” of the Christchurch jubilee airshow loss was why spending on promoting sponsorship of the show was more than the sponsorship itself.

Cr Linda Constable noted that $120,743 was listed in the airshow accounts as the income from sponsorship. The principal sponsorship came from P.D.L. at $lOO,OOO. Set against the sum was $168,171 in spending related to promoting that sponsorship. “I simply cannot understand the financial thinking behind that,” Cr Constable said. She listed several issues in the reporting on the airshow and its build-up that concerned councillors. The first was the lack of reporting by the jubilee committee to the council’s airport committee.

The standard of financial control seemed to be

minimal, she said. She queried the appointment of two temporary staff without reference to the council. She queried also the failure to have a written contract with Television New Zealand for coverage and the late signing of a contract with the commercial manager running the airshow.

Other matters of concern were the question of wet weather and liability insurance, not initially taken out by the jubilee committee; a lack of consultation; the failure to lease early all sites at the airshow; and the failure to provide early plans for handling such a crisis as a fire.

The Town Clerk, Mr John Gray, reported that as soon as it was known that gate-takings for the airshow were down, an investigation was begun by council staff. It found no misappropriation of funds but that financial control was not generally of a high standard.

Reports to the airport committee by the jubilee committee were “less than fully descriptive of the real situation” and contained no financial information at all. The jubilee committee did not report the loss of American Express as a sponsor or its consideration of postponing the airshow. Mr Gray noted that there was no way of knowing in late February that final expenditure would exceed that estimated. The bulk of payments were in March or later. Neither the airport director nor central management were alerted to the potential loss. Mr Gray said council accountability would have been better reflected if there had been more than one councillor on the jubilee committee.

There were lessons to be learned in closer liaison and not drawing up separate budgets for other departments in isolation from the treasury.