Impartial?

We're not so sure

In the way that the BBI frequently grasp at straws, the Bostoninnies blog recently told us: “It is refreshing to be reminded from time to time that to impartial outsiders Boston has much to its credit. We therefore invite our readers to pursue the recent article on Boston in Lincolnshire Life which broadly concludes that things are, all things considered and given the national backdrop, going rather well in our little corner of this great nation.”
As is often the case with the Ninnies, the link to the feature no longer works – although in fairness we have to say that it seems mysteriously to have vanished from the Lincolnshire Life website entirely - but it was written by someone called Glynis Fox with photos by Mick Fox – a regular team when it comes to singing the praises of towns throughout the county.
Whilst we agree that it highlights some good things about Boston, this should come as no surprise, as Lincolnshire Life has never been known to feature a town and then rubbish it.
However, the thrust of the article caused us to raise an eyebrow.
It begins by saying: “Market town traders are being urged to throw more weight behind a business group which is determined to drive up Boston’s economic fortunes.
“Despite facing some objections this summer, Boston BID said it is ‘business as usual’ for the organisation which is keen to encourage the town’s independent traders and national shopkeepers to share their bright ideas for boosting local wealth.”
More than 600 words – around 40% of the feature – then lavish praise on the BID, including the disputed claim about the level of empty shops in the town, and gives the BID star billing on the Community Hub project – which is actually a government inspired and funded initiative which the BBI dumped on the BID to give it something to do and make it look good in the process (or to dodge the flak if it went wrong.)
The feature goes on to mention some of the town’s newer businesses, some of the older established ones, then returns to smarming around Boston BID by saying that “a good programme of events also plays an important role in attracting more visitors. And, with that in mind, Boston’s BID team is currently busy planning for the crowd-pulling Christmas Market on 12th December.”
There’s also a retrospective plug for Boston 200 and another pat on the back for the BBI with the recycling of the council handout on how the council has improved.
As we said at the start, we agree that Boston has much to be proud of.
But we cannot say that we find this feature as "impartial" as the BBI would like us to believe, given that it devotes most of its praise for the BBI backed BID, the BBI backed Boston 200 exhibition and the BBI run council.
A good start would be for someone to assure us that the writer is not the identically named Glynis Fox, who is the PR consultant for Lincoln BIG (the city's equivalent of Boston BID.) Then we might be inclined to reconsider.


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