Govt kick-starts pounds 12m welfare pitch

Four agencies are battling for a huge campaign, worth up to pounds

12 million, to promote the Government’s flagship scheme to get jobless

youngsters back to work.

The Department for Education and Employment has shortlisted two large

agencies, DMB&B and TBWA Simons Palmer, and two smaller shops, St Luke’s

and Duckworth Finn Grubb Waters, to pitch for the account at the end of

this month.

The campaign, which will break in January, will target under 25s who

have been unemployed for six months, and will urge businessmen to

provide places for them under the Government’s ’new deal’, the

cornerstone of Chancellor Gordon Brown’s first Budget (Campaign, 4

July).

It is thought that between pounds 4 million and pounds 6 million will be

spent on ads in each of the next two years. If it performs well, the

winning agency will be in line for further work as the Welfare to Work

programme will continue for the five-year Parliament in what will be the

Labour Government’s biggest campaign.

Although the push is expected to include television, the brief puts the

onus on agencies to provide a media mix. ’This is an extremely

challenging brief,’ a Whitehall source said. ’We want the agencies to

demonstrate strong strategic planning ability, powerful creative

capability, successful business, youth and public sector campaigns and

an excellent track record in producing heavily branded, fully integrated

campaigns.’

Whitehall officials want to weigh up the benefits of working with a

highly committed team and a small, innovative shop against the safer bet

of a larger agency. St Luke’s has no Whitehall business but officials

were impressed with its client list, including Eurostar, Boots and Ikea.

Duckworth Finn handles the Government’s anti-drugs campaign.

DMB&B worked on the DFEE’s modern apprenticeships scheme and holds the

Government’s drink-drive account. TBWA was chosen because of a good

record with business and youth clients, including BT, Nissan, Nike and

Sony Playstation.

This article was first published on Campaign