Public relations practitioners have been stunned by the appalling lack of PR sensitivity of a party of county councillors who went on a fact-finding mission to a lap-dancing club at the taxpayer's expense.
A team of 13 local authority officials from Cornwall Council spent an evening at Temptations T2 strip club in Plymouth, on what they described as an extremely worthwhile visit.
The council recently voted to adopt new government legislation reclassifying gentlemen's clubs as sexual entertainment venues and arranged the trip as a way of helping it to make informed decisions about licensing laws in the future.
But the visit inevitably caught the attention of both regional and national newspapers, sparking public outrage and putting the authority directly in the firing line of furious Cornish council taxpayers, astounded by the extraordinary waste of public money.
Several councillors attempted to appease the public by claiming that they came out of the visit very well informed.
But PR professionals believe that the response was exceptionally weak and that the council should have been far more specific as to exactly how the trip was informative.
Nevertheless, most PR specialists agree that this is simply a case where you cannot defend the indefensible.
By contrast, had the council sent just one or two representatives to the club, the trip would have been nothing more than a source of minor personal embarrassment.
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