British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s discreet chief media strategist was in the spotlight of bad publicity on Wednesday for allegedly suggesting that the Paris airport disaster might be an opportunity to boost London’s bid to host the 2012 Olympics.
David Hill told colleagues at a meeting on Monday that the collapse of ultra-modern Terminal 2E at Charles de Gaulle airport, which left four dead, would enable the government to ”draw attention to the inadequacies of the French transport infrastructure”.
He also said that he had made ”one or two calls myself over the weekend” on the matter, the Daily Mail newspaper reported.
A spokesperson for Blair did not deny that the remarks had been made, and referred to what Hill told the Daily Mail — that they were not meant to have been taken seriously.
”It was a flippant aside made at an internal meeting that was not designed to be serious or cause offence,” Hill said.
The Daily Mail said Hill prefaced his remarks by asking if anyone was present from the Department of Culture, Media and Sport — the ministry that is overseeing London’s bid to host the Olympics.
Since Paris is also in the running for the 2012 games, Hill’s remarks were interpreted as an attempt to exploit the airport disaster to promote the London bid, which is hampered by the capital’s problem-plagued mass transit system.
Liam Fox, co-chairperson of the main opposition Conservatives, criticised Hill, saying ”the insensitivity of these remarks speaks volumes” about the preoccupation of the prime minister’s office with ”spinning” news events to its favour.
It recalled an infamous incident in which a ministerial adviser, Jo Moore, sent a memo to a colleague within hours of the September 11 attacks in the United States in 2001 saying it was a ”very good day” to bury bad news. She was later fired.
Hill, who was communications director for Blair’s governing Labour party for much of the 1990s, succeeded the powerful Alastair Campbell who resigned in August last year amid a row with the BBC over a report that alleged that the prime minister’s office had ”sexed up” intelligence on Iraq.
Unlike Campbell, whose combative streak made him many enemies, Hill has favoured a more low-key approach in dealing with the media, and has personally kept a more discreet profile. — Sapa-AFP