South Glos Council is to axe adverts on its websites after inadvertently promoting fish and chips on its healthy lifestyles page, air travel to readers of its climate emergency measures, and luxury ship cruises to housing benefits claimants.
The council has admitted the ads were “misleading and inappropriate”.
Officers have recommended scrapping all advertising on the authority’s public-facing websites when they move to a new content management system (CMS) this year.
A report to cabinet member for corporate resources, Cllr Adam Monk, said: “The content of adverts displayed on our websites is an uncertainty since we do not control exactly what is shown to users (although we do exclude certain categories of adverts).
“Adverts shown might not always accurately support the council’s values. For example, adverts have previously appeared that promote air travel on our climate and nature emergency page, fish and chip shops on our healthy lifestyles’ website, and cruises on a page for users claiming housing benefit.
“In 2026, our main public websites will move to a new CMS platform. As a result some design changes will be needed. Incorporating advertising would significantly limit the flexibility of this design and is expected to negatively impact overall user experience.
“Since most of the advertising is national and multinational companies, the removal of advertising would reduce confusion about whether the advertising links to council services. The financial impact is very low.”
Officers have included screengrabs in the report showing examples of inappropriate adverts on its three websites that carry them – its main site, healthy lifestyle-focused One You South Gloucestershire, and South Glos Life, which provides residents with information and advice on council services.
They include an advert for Marella Cruises at the top of the page for people trying to claim housing benefits. A two-week Caribbean cruise by the operator costs up to £8,938 in total for two people sharing, based on the latest search. A huge advert for fish and chips and an ad for pub lunches were on the same home page of One You. And a promotion for air travel featured prominently next to information telling residents what the authority was doing to tackle climate change.
The report said the websites’ actual income for the first 12 months was £4,145.74, rising to a high of £7,245.65 two years later before plummeting steadily to £1,788.77 in 2023/24 and £1,301.11 last year.
The report said the shortfall was because the operator “admitted to overestimation of income” and advert clicks had continued to fall since 2018, a trend accelerated by increasing use of ad-blocking software.
It said: “Council officers have expressed concern where the presence of advertising is perceived to threaten council commercial activity or recruitment activity, although
there is currently no evidence of any commercial impact.”
By Adam Postans, Local Democracy Reporter