NEWS: Simpson takes over at Camden

Julia Simpson, a key player in the Government’s defeat over Post Office

privatisation, has won the pounds 48,000 role of Camden Council

communications chief.

Simpson, 38, head of communications at the Communication Workers Union,

joins Camden on 9 September, as assistant chief executive, quality and

communications.

At Camden, where she succeeds Lorraine Langham, now Hackney Council

assistant chief executive (PR and communications), she will head up 70

staff across press and PR, marketing, design, quality and customer

services and welfare rights.

Simpson said she is not deterred by Camden’s tough media image. ‘The

council is in the black and is under very good, strong leadership,’ she

said.

‘It offers enormous challenges because it includes some of the

wealthiest areas in London, such as Highgate and Hampstead, and some of

the poorest. In PR terms, my role will be as much about winning the

hearts and minds of the staff as explaining the role of Camden Council,’

she added.

Simpson joined the CWU, formerly the Union of Communication Workers, in

1993, charged with a brief to halt Post Office privatisation and

relaunching the union’s internal and external publications.

Her team played a key part in the following year’s defeat of the

Government’s plan to privatise the Post Office by galvanising the

union’s 160,000 members with internal campaigning materials and a

revamped union magazine. It was also credited with an effective press

and parliamentary campaign working alongside Lowe Bell Political, whose

appointment caused shock waves in union circles due to Sir Tim Bell’s

close links with the Conservative Party.

Before joining the UCW, Simpson edited the monthly journal of the

National Union of Civil and Public Servants, now the Public Services,

Tax and Commerce Union, and worked for the Spanish newspaper the Iberian

Daily Sun.