British government launches ‘Get Ready for Brexit’ campaign

The billboards have been unveiled, the branded mugs have been ordered and the adverts will soon start following you around the internet after the government launched what is claimed to be the largest ever public information campaign in an attempt to prepare the British public for leaving the European Union.

The Get Ready for Brexit campaign went live on Sunday, stating that the UK will be leaving the EU on October 31st and urging the public to visit a new website to check what they need to do to prepare for a no-deal exit. The slogan appeared for the first time on a giant advertising screen next to a John Lewis store at the Westfield shopping centre in Stratford, east London, looming over shoppers arriving for an end-of-summer shopping trip.

Downing Street has previously briefed that the taxpayer-funded advertising campaign will cost up to £100 million (€111 million), although doubts have been raised over whether the government will realistically be able to spend that much on a campaign lasting just two months. One leading advertising industry source said this figure is substantially higher than the amount spent on traditional advertising in the UK by big consumer brands such as Amazon, Tesco and Asda in the whole of 2018.

This suggests that either the government is overstating the amount it intends to spend in an attempt to draw extra attention, or that Downing Street really is launching an advertising campaign that will be unequalled in its ubiquity.

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Minister in charge of no-deal planning Michael Gove said “ensuring an orderly Brexit is not only a matter of national importance, but a shared responsibility”, as he launched the adverts. He also referenced government polling that showed only 50 per cent of the population think it likely the UK will leave the EU on October 31st.

The same research found that 42 per cent of small- to medium-sized businesses are still unsure of how they can prepare for Brexit. And just a third of the British public have looked for information on what they will need to do, suggesting large-scale ignorance of what Brexit will involve with less than two months to go until the expected departure date.

Mugs and T-shirts

The Get Ready campaign, which shares its name with a song by the Temptations and an album by New Order, is likely to incorporate TV, radio, newspaper and online adverts. Roadshows are expected to take place across the country and online video tutorials are promised. According to the London Times there has also been a substantial order placed for branded mugs and T-shirts, amid claims that the government briefly considered reusing the Vote Leave slogan “take back control” on the official campaign.

Theresa May’s administration spent relatively small amounts, measured in the hundreds of thousands of pounds, on publicly funded advertising campaigns supporting her abandoned withdrawal agreement in the run-up to the original Brexit deadline in March.

This is not the first public information campaign called Get Ready for Brexit. Dutch port operators launched a website with the same name in January, suggesting foreign countries may have been doing their best to educate businesses on the risks of a disorderly Brexit for longer than the UK government. – Guardian