Essex council paid social media prankster nearly £500,000 during pandemic

In 2021 the comedian was paid more than the Prime Minister makes in a year
Simon Harris helped the council with social media management
BBC
Jordan King11 January 2024

Essex County Council (ECC) paid close to £500,000 for a social media comedian to run "community engagement" throughout three years of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Finance documents released by the council show that Simon Harris, 40, made a total of £493,000 between June 4, 2020, and April 24, 2023.

His role was to provide "digital consultancy and delivery via social media channels" which included running a Facebook page and online community group for the campaign Essex Coronavirus Action (ECA).

In 2021, Mr Harris received £279,000 – more than the Prime Minister earns in a year.

The revelation comes just two days after the authority announced that it is raising its council tax by 4.99 per cent to "protect and develop essential services" from April.

ECC has faced criticism for what the TaxPayers' Alliance’s digital campaign manager Joe Ventre called "a waste of money".

He said: "While residents paid the price of the pandemic, the last thing they expected their hard-earned cash to be spent on is lining the pockets of a comedian.

"Essex County Council owe it to local households to crack down on waste and focus funds on frontline services."

Deputy Chairman of the Conservative Party, Lee Anderson, who was often taunted by Mr Harris on social media, took a jibe at the comedian.

He wrote on X, formerly Twitter: "Is this the same Simon Harris who has been trolling me on social media for the past year?

"Sending my best wishes to Simon at this difficult time."

The council said it is not able to comment on individual employees but stressed that "the payments covered more than just social media content, and included activity to directly support others doing similar work across the country".

A spokesperson said: "During the pandemic, and given the nature of the national emergency which the council was faced with, that contractor relationship was utilised to use social media – principally through the Essex Coronavirus Action (ECVA) channel - to engage with communities and share valuable information relating to restrictions, provide support to vulnerable individuals, volunteering opportunities including recruiting volunteers for vaccination centres, and share information on the various restrictions which were in place at various times, including their introduction, relaxation and what was and wasn’t allowed, throughout 2020, 2021 and into 2022.

"Much of the activity and campaigning concerned was amplifying information which the County Council had published and shared via its corporate social media channels, enabling the council to reach and engage with a much larger proportion of its population than would otherwise have been possible.

"The engagement levels the council achieved through ECVA and other social media channels managed by Simon Harris during the pandemic period were far in excess of what the council would usually have expected during a ‘normal’ period of operation."

The Standard has contacted Mr Harris for comment.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in