A controversial council advert campaign cost twice as much as was originally claimed.

Brighton and Hove City Council used the slogan “Status Quo fans need not apply” in its search for four £125,000-a-year strategic directors.

After The Argus submitted a Freedom of Information (FoI) request – to which every public body is obliged by law to provide a factual response to – the local authority stated the campaign cost £7,000.

Yet now it has been revealed the true cost to taxpayers was £14,000 – double the initial figure.

The Argus will now report the process to the Information Commissioner, who is the Government’s regulator of the Freedom of Information Act.

Liberal Democrat councillor Paul Elgood said: “It’s absolutely outrageous.

“The council needs to be completely open and transparent in all of its dealings especially when it comes to the appointment of these controversial strategic directors.

“So far the whole process has been a shambles and full of distrust.”

The advertising ploy, which was first reported in The Argus, led to national exposure and furious reaction from the band’s fans.

The local authority initially stated it could not reveal the full cost as some of the information was “commercially sensitive”.

Two separate FoI requests were submitted asking the local authority for the amount.

The request from The Argus asked: “How much did the council spend on creating the recruitment campaign “Say no to Status Quo?”

The other request, from a man calling himself Fred Ormerod, stated: “How much, in total, did the council pay the recruitment agency used recently to recruit four strategy directors?”

While The Argus received a reply naming one figure, it was only after Mr Ormerod threatened to ask for an internal review of the decision that the true cost was revealed.

The council yesterday stated the £7,000 revealed to The Argus was spent on the national advertising costs and that the additional amount was for the creation of a website, www.saynotostatusquo.co.uk.

If found guilty of malpractice by the Government regulator, a practice recommendation could be enforced on the local authority, which would force it to reveal more in FoI requests.

A council spokesman said: “We would be happy to investigate any complaint The Argus might have about the information it received under the Freedom of Information Act but are unable to comment on any complaint before it has been investigated.”