Plymouth City Council owns and pays £60 per year for the rights to use a total of 61 website addresses at a total annual cost of £3,660.
That sounds like a lot of URLs. You’re probably wondering what they all are. Well, I asked, using the Freedom of Information Act, and I was amazed when I went through and tested each one – 27 led nowhere. With each costing £60 per year, that’s £1,620 of taxpayers’ money down the drain.
While www.visitplymouth.co.uk works fine and promotes the city as a destination for tourists, there are others that just left me scratching my head… why, for example, has the Conservative-run city council spent a total of £360 on www.buymountedgcumbe.co.uk, www.buymountedgcumbe.com.uk, www.buymountedgcumbe.net, www.buyplymouth.co.uk, www.buyplymouth.com and www.buyplymouth.net? Is it planning some kind of massive sell-off?
Then there’s the £240 spent on www.plymouthpcn.co.uk, www.plymouthpcn.com, www.plymouthpcn.net and www.plymouthpcn.org. None of them lead anywhere, and I am not even sure what they’d be about – Penalty Charge Notices (parking tickets)?
What about www.plymouthwinterfestival.co.uk and www.plymouthwinterfestival.com? They sound promising until you click on them.
We are in a time of acute spending restraint. Every penny saved on waste like this is a penny that doesn’t have to be taken from the frontline. It’s time for Plymouth’s ruling Conservative councillors to stop paying for these websites to nowhere.
(Note: the original sum of £1,660 has been amended to £1,620)
(image: Ethernet Cable 
Some rights reserved by David Davies)
£60 per year? I pay £3 per year for .co.uk, less than £7 per year for .com etc. I’m sure it’s all done under some ‘best value’ sourcing arrangement, ie best value for everyone except the taxpayer.
I can understand why they may want to register variants of relevant domains so a total of 61 domains doesn’t sound too bad really, as long as they do, or are planned to, serve a purpose.
The bad thing is that they are paying £60 per year, per domain! Rip-off! As TimB said, these can be had for around £5/£10 each from many of the domain registrars that can be found online with a quick Google search.
A quick WHOIS lookup on one of the domains shows that Plymouth City Council are using RM Education PLC as their domain registrar. This company has supplied schools and the like with computer equipment for many, many years (I remember using RM Nimbus computers at school). I would strongly suggest Plymouth City Council consider using a different supplier. How about a local business for a start?
I’d love to know what else RM Education PLC supplies Plymouth City Council with, and how much the council is paying for the ‘privilege’.
Steve,
I suspect RM is supplying the schools internet access as they are the ISP for the SWGFL?
Both RM network and SWGFL have wesbites so that could be a source of info.
TimB, Steve & Graham – thanks all three of you for leaving comments. Yes, you’re right about costs. When I get a moment I will try to look into it.
BTW, if you want to look at how much the council pays any particular supplier then this is a useful place to start: http://www.plymouth.gov.uk/spendover500