Political

Conservative by-election campaign runs into a spot of legal bother

Ah happy memories. Remember the glories of last summer and the Ealing Southall by-election when the Conservatives sanctimoniously threatened the Liberal Democrats with legal action over use of an image in a leaflet, saying that this was an outrageous breach of the law, would result in a huge financial penalty, the end of the world etc. etc. – all at the same time as putting out a leaflet themselves that, er…, did exactly what they were complaining of others doing?

You might have thought being caught out saying one thing whilst doing another would have resulted in a slight pause for caution during the Crewe and Nantwich by-election.

But oh no.

Because the BBC reports:

The Conservatives took out a writ stopping Labour using a photo-shopped snap of Mr Timpson wearing a top hat.

So at the same time as complaining about breach of copyright, you’d have thought the Conservative leaflets would all be squeaky clean on this score perhaps?

You’d be wrong. In literature and in news releases the Conservatives have made repeated use of a Google Map based image about the Labour candidate living in Wales. Bit of an issue then that the terms and conditions for that image only allowed it to be used for free for private or internal use. A political party’s leaflet delivered through lots of letterboxes isn’t really either is it?

In the interests of consistency, I look forward to the news that the Conservatives have taken out a writ against themselves…

UPDATE: More legal trouble for the Conservatives in the Crewe and Nantwich campaign.

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