Ending Physical Punishment campaign

28 June 2022

Dear

ATISN 16393: Ending Physical Punishment promotion costs

Thank you for your request which I received on 13 June 2022.  You asked for:

• The total promotional spend to date on the publicity campaign relating to ending physical punishment of children in Wales. That could include, but not limited to, TV ads, newspaper adverts, radio ads, online adverts, back of buses, paying an external company to do all of that etc
• The current total planned promotional spend
• The amount of promotional spend on the campaign placing any kind of paid promotion on the titles that were eligible to Welsh Government funding in 2019.

Response

• The total promotional spend to date on the Ending Physical Punishment campaign to promote the public awareness of the change in the law is £1,904,701.56 (net).  For clarity, this figure includes the value of the contract that provides advertising for the campaign, stakeholder engagement, PR and engagement costs with groups and underrepresented communities who have specific communication needs or concerns about the legislation. The timeframe for this request is being understood to be from May 2016 (date of the election which provided a mandate for the manifesto commitment to prohibit physical punishment of children) until the date of the request.
• For the Ending Physical Punishment campaign, the Welsh Government have allocated a budget of £950,000 (net) over 3 years from 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2025. Of this £157,017 (net) has been spent since 1 April 2022. The Welsh Government budget has not yet been allocated beyond 31 March 2025, but an additional £150,000 is currently projected to be spent in 2025/26 as set out on page 49 of the Explanatory Memorandum for the legislation which can be found here.

• For clarity, no list is held by the Welsh Government of organisations who were eligible to apply for the Independent Community Journalism Fund (Fund). Of those organisations who applied to the Fund and received grant funding, no advertising spend has been awarded to run advertisements for the Ending Physical Punishment campaign to date.

Next steps

If you are dissatisfied with the Welsh Government’s handling of your request, you can ask for an internal review within 40 working days of the date of this response.  Requests for an internal review should be addressed to the Welsh Government’s Freedom of Information Officer at:

Information Rights Unit, 
Welsh Government,
Cathays Park, 
Cardiff, 
CF10 3NQ 
or Email: Freedom.ofinformation@gov.wales

Please remember to quote the ATISN reference number above.   

You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner.  The Information Commissioner can be contacted at:  Information Commissioner’s Office,

Wycliffe House, 
Water Lane, 
Wilmslow, 
Cheshire, 
SK9 5AF.

However, please note that the Commissioner will not normally investigate a complaint until it has been through our own internal review process.

Yours sincerely