UK media coverage of the 2016 EU Referendum campaign Martin Moore and Gordon Ramsay Centre for the Study of Media, Communication and Power May 2017 Centre for the study of Media, Communication & The Policy Institute at King’s Power About the Centre for the Study of Media, Communication and Power The Centre for the Study of Media, Communication and Power explores how news provision, political communication, public discourse, civic engagement and media power are changing in the digital age. We do this through rigorous empirical research, and communication of the findings of this research to inform relevant academic and public policy debates and civic society responses, in order to help promote diversity, fairness, transparency and accountability in media and communication. About the Policy Institute at King’s College London The Policy Institute at King’s College London addresses complex policy and practice challenges with rigorous research, academic expertise and analysis focused on improving outcomes. Our vision is to undertake and enable the translation of research into policy and practice, and the translation of policy and practice needs into a demand-focused research culture. We do this by bringing diverse groups together, and facilitating engagement between academic, business, philanthropic and policy communities around current and future societal issues for the UK and internationally. The views contained in this report are those of the authors alone. This research has received no external funding Contents Acknowledgments iv Introduction 1 Summary 7 Overall numbers 11 Setting the EU Referendum in news context 15 The EU Referendum on the front pages 19 EU Referendum front pages 20 Immigration front pages 22 Economy front pages 22 Issues covered within the EU Referendum debate 25 Number of EU Referendum-related articles referencing each issue 26 Issue Trends (Economy, Immigration and NHS/Health) 28 Individuals covered during the campaign 31 Individuals’ share of voice on specific issues 33 Issues 34 Economy 35 Immigration 63 Sovereignty 115 Dishonesty 127 Fear 139 The Establishment 149 An acrimonious and divisive campaign 163 Methodology 169 Appendix: Links to selected data 182 iii About the authors Martin Moore Dr Martin Moore is director of the Centre for the Study of Media, Communication and Power, and a Senior Research Fellow in the Policy Institute at King’s College London. Gordon Ramsay Dr Gordon Ramsay is deputy director of the Centre for the Study of Media, Communication and Power, and a Research Fellow in the Policy Institute at King’s College London. Acknowledgements This study had its genesis in the days after 23 June 2016 and, as these projects often do, has grown larger in scope and taken considerably longer than we originally intended. It would not have been possible without the ongoing help of Ben Campbell, who built our digital news content software that powered our analysis. Over the summer of 2016 Yolanda Lopez Hernan helped us collect and classify newspaper front pages, and to update our political dictionaries. We are particularly grateful to Professor Brian Cathcart, who kindly agreed to edit a first draft of the study. Two academics with long experience in media content analysis and coverage of European issues, Professor Julian Petley and Dr Sally Broughton Micova, reviewed our final draft. We would like to thank them both for their review and comments. We would also like to thank the Policy Institute at King’s College London, and particularly George Murkin, who designed our study and, along with Sarah Rawlings, worked with us on its communication and distribution. Independent reviewers Professor Julian Petley (Brunel University) Dr Sally Broughton Micova (University of East Anglia) iv Introduction Introduction This is the first study to examine all articles published about the 2016 EU referendum by the leading UK national news outlets online, including national press, digital-only news services, and the online news services of the leading broadcasters for the period of the official referendum campaign. Through a combination of qualitative and quantitative content analysis, this study documents and evaluates the way in which the national media covered the most significant decision made by the UK electorate in the 21st century. It captures the people and the issues that were covered, the language that was used and the themes that characterised the campaign. It builds on the findings published by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (RISJ), in conjunction with PRIME Research,1 by Loughborough University,2 and by Cardiff University.3 The RISJ/ PRIME research, published in September 2016, sampled national print newspapers and found a ‘dominant pro-Brexit bias’. The Loughborough study sampled television news bulletins as well as print newspapers, and also found evidence of coverage weighted in favour of ‘out’ over ‘in’, with the conduct of the campaign itself attracting the most coverage, ahead of immigration and the economy. The Cardiff analysis of television news bulletins throughout the campaign found that process stories 1 Levy, D.A.L., Aslan, B. and Bironzo, D. (2016) UK Press Coverage of the EU Referendum, Oxford: RISJ http:// reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/UK%20Press%20Coverage%20of%20the%20EU%20 Referendum_0.pdf 2 Deacon, D., Downey, J., Harmer, E., Stanyer, J. and Wring, D. (2016) ‘The narrow agenda: How the news media covered the Referendum,’ in Daniel Jackson, Einar Thorsen and Dominic Wring (eds.) EU Referendum Analysis 2016: Media, Voters and the Campaign, Bournemouth University http://bit.ly/EUReferendumAnalysis2016_Jackson- Thorsen-and-Wring_v1 3 Cushion, S. and Lewis, J. (2016) ‘Scrutinising statistical claims and constructing balance: Television news coverage of the 2016 EU Referendum,’ in Jackson, D., Thorsen, E. and Wring, D. (eds.) EU Referendum Analysis 2016: Media, Voters and the Campaign, Bournemouth University http://bit.ly/EUReferendumAnalysis2016_Jackson- Thorsen-and-Wring_v1 2 about campaigning practices, strategies and polling dominated, with the economy and immigration again the most prevalent policy issues. This study examines all relevant articles published online over the official 10-week campaign (from 15 April to 23 June) by the following: Broadcasters (online only) BBC: bbc.co.uk/news ITV: itv.com/news Channel 4: channel4.com/news Sky News: news.sky.com Newspapers The Daily Mail (includes Mail on Sunday): dailymail.co.uk The Daily Express (includes Sunday Express): express.co.uk The Daily Mirror (includes the Sunday People): mirror.co.uk The Daily Star and Daily Star Sunday: dailystar.co.uk The Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph: telegraph.co.uk The Financial Times: ft.com The Guardian and Observer: theguardian.com/uk The Independent: independent.co.uk The Times (including The Sunday Times): thetimes.co.uk The Sun (including the Sun on Sunday): thesun.co.uk News magazines The Economist: economist.com The New Statesman: newstatesman.com The Spectator: spectator.co.uk (including blogs.spectator.co.uk) Digital-only Buzzfeed UK: buzzfeed.com/?country=uk Huffington Post UK: huffingtonpost.co.uk Vice UK: vice.com/en_uk Of the national news outlets eight endorsed Leave: the Sun, the Daily Mail, the Daily Express, the Sunday Express, the Daily Telegraph, the Sunday Telegraph, The Sunday Times, and the Spectator. Eight supported Remain: The Times, the Guardian, the Observer, the FT, the Independent, 3 the Mail on Sunday, the Mirror, and the New Statesman. Buzzfeed, HuffPo UK, Vice UK, and the Star (Daily and Sunday) did not formally endorse either side, though the editorial perspective of the first three lent towards Remain, while the Star strongly favoured Leave. The BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Sky were required by law to be neutral. Figure 1: Number of articles analysed Articles collected 351,166 General news and opinion articles 98,090 Articles on political issues 30,581 Articles relating to the EU Referendum 14,779 In total over the 10-week campaign the 20 news outlets published 351,166 articles on all subjects, of which 253,076 had no relevance to this study (dealing with matters including sport and celebrity). Of the remaining 98,090, two-thirds made no reference to any of the political issues identified as significant. This left 30,581 articles, half of which made no reference to the referendum. In all, therefore, 14,779 articles touched on both the political issues and on the referendum, and these were the focus of the study (see Figure 1). They included news, features, leading articles (editorials) and opinion articles. In addition to the online articles, every lead story on every print newspaper front page was analysed. For a full explanation of the methodology see the end of this study. The study starts with the numbers. How much coverage of the EU Referendum campaign was there over the 10 weeks? How did this compare between different outlets? Which newspapers paid most attention to the referendum and to what extent were front pages dominated by the economy and immigration? What issues were covered each week by which titles? What campaign stories set the agenda? Who did the coverage focus on and what issues were they most associated with? 4 Having captured the numbers the study examines the issues that defined the campaign: the economy, immigration, sovereignty, dishonesty, fear, and the ‘Establishment’. For each issue it breaks the coverage down in terms of quantity – who said what where, and by type of coverage. It looks at the extent to which news outlets followed the leads set by the campaigns themselves and the extent to which they pursued their own agendas. 5 Summary Summary Volume and prominence • Almost 15,000 EU Referendum-related articles were published online across 20 national news outlets during the official campaign. • 195 national newspaper print front pages led on Brexit over the same period, out of a total of 550. Economy • The economy was the most covered campaign issue (7,028 articles), followed by immigration (4,383 articles), with health a distant third (1,638 articles).