Press and broadcasting: 'Real issues' and real coverage

Parliamentary Affairs

Volumn 54, Issue 4, 2001, Pages 666-678

  Deacon, David ^a   Goldin g, Peter ^a   Billig, Michael ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0035486136     PISSN: 00312290     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/parlij/54.4.666     Document Type: Article

References (27)

1. House of Commons, Royal Commission on the Press: Final Report, Cm 6810, HMSO, 1977, pp. 98-9.
2. D. Deacon, P. Golding and M. Billig, 'Between Fear and Loathing: National Press Coverage of the 1997 British General Election' in D. Denver, J. Fisher, P. Cowley and C. Pattie (eds), British Elections and Parties Review, 8, Frank Cass. 1998.
3. The research was commissioned by the Guardian newspaper. The newspapers coded were the: Sun, Mirror, Star, Mail, Daily Record, Express, Scotsman, Financial Times, The Times, Guardian, Daily Telegraph and Independent. The broadcast news coded comprised: the BBC1 10pm news, ITN News at Ten, BBC2 Newsnight, Channel 4's 7pm news, Channel 5's 5.30 News, Sky News 9pm, BBC Radio 4's 'Today' programme (7.30am-8.30am). The analysis began on 7 May and ended on 6 June. Research findings were published every Monday in the Guardian, and to meet the copy deadlines coding was restricted to weekday election coverage. For the newspapers, analysis was restricted to all hard news items and leader editorials found on the frontpages, designated home news sections, designated election segments or pages carrying leader editorials. Feature items or commentary pieces were not coded. An item was deemed to be 'election related' if there was any manifest reference made to the campaign. Our coding team were Katie MacMillan, Liz Sutton, Sue Becker, Mike Fitchett, Jackie Goode, Dianne Poppleton-Brown and Kate Radley.
4. Levels of coverage in Channel 4 News were identical for 1997 and 2001. For BBC2 Newsnight, the amount of coverage was 18% down, for ITV News at Ten there was a 9% reduction, and BBC1 10pm news, a 29% reduction. The large decrease in BBC news coverage is mainly explained by the Corporation's decision not to extend its main bulletin from 30 to 50 minutes, as it had in 1997.
5. D. Deacon et al., op. cit.
6. J. Blumler and M. Gurevitch, The Crisis in Public Communication, Routledge, 1995, p. 89.
7. Ibid.
8. Home office Guidelines on Procedures at a General Election, 2001. (http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/ elections/electionbriefing.htm#broadcasting).
9. See the BBC producer guidelines (http://www.bbc.co.uk/info/genelection/index.shtml) and ITC Programme codes (http://www.itc.org.uk/regulating/prog_reg/prog_code/section_4.asp).
10. 'Labour May Rethink Blair's Backdrops', Guardian, 10.5.01, p. 7.
11. See, M. Billig, D. Deacon and S. Middleton, 'In the Hands of Spin Doctors: Television, Politics and the 1992 General Election' in N. Miller and R. Allen (eds), It's Live But Is It Real?, John Libbey, 1993; Deacon et al., op. cit.
12. See, M. Billig, D. Deacon and S. Middleton, 'In the Hands of Spin Doctors: Television, Politics and the 1992 General Election' in N. Miller and R. Allen (eds), It's Live But Is It Real?, John Libbey, 1993; Deacon et al., op. cit.
13. In 1992 the founding aspects of the modern publicity process were already clearly evident (a 'presidentialised' campaign, an emphasis on spin and impression management, etc). Therefore, although the reductions between 1992 and 1997 may not seem large, they represent a significant additional compression in what was already a highly pressurised process. Furthermore, the averages presented here cannot be compared directly with averages outlined in US studies (e.g. T. Patterson, Out of Order, Vintage, 1994, pp. 74-6). This is because our figures represent the total amount of speaking time a specific political source had in an individual news item. As such, these figures are in many cases based on an aggregation of sound-bite time, rather than the timing of individual speech acts.
14. M.R. Kerbel, Remote and Controlled: Media Politics in a Cynical Age, 2e, Westview, 1999, p. 89.
15. K. Newton and M. Brynin, 'The National Press and Party Voting in the UK', Political Studies, 49, 2001, p. 267.
16. C. Seymour-Ure, The British Press and Broadcasting Since 1945, Blackwell, 1991, p. 199.
17. M. Linton, 'Press Ganged at the Polls' in M. Linton (ed.), The Guide to the Home of Commons, Fourth Estate, 1992, p. 27.
18. P. Norris. 'Political Communications' in P. Dunleavy, A. Gamble, I. Holliday and G. Peele (eds), Developments in British Politics 5, Macmillan, 1997, p. 82.
19. See also D. Wring, 'The "Tony" Press: Media Coverage of the Election Campaign' in A. Geddes and J. Tonge (eds), Labour's Second Landslide, Manchester University Press, 2001.
20. P. Norris, J. Curtice, D. Sanders, M. Scammell and H. Semetko, On Message, Sage, 1999, p. 160.
21. H. Semetko, M. Scammell and T. Nossiter, 'The Media's Coverage of the Campaign' in A. Heath, R. Jowell, and J. Curtice (eds), Labour's Last Chance? The 1992 Election and Beyond, Dartmouth, 1992.
22. The Financial Times, Star and Independent.
23. The Sun, News of the World, Financial Times, The Times, Sunday Times, Mail on Sunday.
24. D. Deacon et al., op. cit.
25. The Sun, News of the World, Mail, Financial Times, The Times, Sunday Times, Sunday Express, Independent, Independent on Sunday.
26. See the British Election Survey http://mvw.essex.ac.uk/bes/.
27. D. Seymour, 'Trembling Before the Right-Wing Press', 12 British Journalism Review 2, 2001, pp. 14-15.