Parliamentary candidate told to remove large helium balloon

Conservative candidate for Edmonton, Andrew Charalambous, has run into trouble with the law after tethering a large advertising helium balloon to the grounds of his office and also placing advertising hoardings outside it (see photo in the Enfield Independent’s story).

Such actions normally require planning permission. Although there is a special exemption from some planning controls on advertising for political ads in the period of an election campaign, that exemption has not yet come in to play for the general election.

Despite this, Andrew Charalambous has been unapologetic, defending to the media his use balloons and posters as a matter of freedom of speech.

However, seeing how countries which much more relaxed rules on the display of advertisements often see their communities blighted by over-advertising, I’d say the laws actually work pretty well here. There are good grounds for making an allowance to let people put up garden posters during an election campaign, but that shouldn’t be extended to claim that politicians should just be exempt from planning rules.

Under the Town and CountryPlanning (Control of Advertisements) (England) Regulations 2007, advertisements which would normally require planning permission can be put up for a pending election and must be removed within 14 days of polling day. However, as the general election is not on a fixed date and has not yet been called, it is not a “pending” election for the purposes of this law.