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Hackney Council has asked a local news website to remove two audio clips of a phone call with a council employee, a spokesperson confirmed today.

Last week the community news site, Hackney Citizen, reported that a Hackney Council employee incorrectly informed a caller that there was no Conservative party candidate standing in the Hackney Mayoral election .

The caller was the Conservative party candidate himself, Andrew Boff. The site published two audio clips of Boff's call to the council.

The confusion arose following the council's decision to omit Boff's election address from the mayoral leaflet, although he was listed as a candidate. According to the Hackney Citizen, Boff claimed that his address had been omitted because he had included salary details of the council mayor and cabinet.

In a council statement published by Hackney Citizen, a spokesperson said: "The exclusion of Mr Boff's election address from the booklet was a complicated legal issue, and though the staff member gave the correct information at first, unfortunately as Mr Boff persisted in asking the staff member to say whether or not he was a candidate, the incorrect response was given as this was a technical issue beyond the knowledge of the staff member."

In a comment on the Hackney Citizen website, Boff says that he did not blame the individual council staff member who took his call for the error.

Hackney Council then asked for the audio to be removed, in a letter issued by its legal and democratic services department. In regards to the request, a council spokesperson told Journalism.co.uk: "The Council has taken this step due to concern about how a recording was made of a conversation with a junior staff member without their knowledge and then circulated without their consent.

"We have therefore asked that this recording be removed from the website concerned."

But Hackney Citizen has not complied: "The Council says that it will apply for an injunction and its legal costs if we do not comply with its request forthwith," Hackney Citizen says on its site.

"We take the view that it is in the public interest to disclose the way the Council was dealing with the issue, as evidenced by the audio clips."

On 7 May, it was announced that Labour candidate Jules Pipe has been returned as Mayor of Hackney in the 2010 elections.

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Written by
Judith Townend

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