Page 73 - An Introduction to Political Communication Fifth Edition

Intro to Politics Communication (5th edn)-p.qxp 9/2/11 10:55 Page 52

POLITICS IN THE AGE OF MEDIATION
the public interest, between distinct viewpoints. Historically, the great major-
ity of British newspapers have supported one party – the Conservatives, a
pattern of bias which peaked in the early 1990s. Table 4.1 shows the party
political affiliations of each national newspaper at the 1992 general election.
Of twenty daily and Sunday titles, six supported the Labour Party, two
declined to declare a preference, and twelve supported the Conservatives.
The Tory-supporting press accounted for 70 per cent of national newspaper
circulation in total, as compared to Labour’s 27 per cent. This pro-
Conservative bias, consistent with the pattern of press partisanship through-
out the twentieth century, was in sharp contrast both to the spread of votes
in the election (the Tories took 41 per cent of the total votes, compared to
Labour’s 37 per cent and the Liberal Democrats’ 20 per cent) and, in some
cases, such as that of the Daily Star, to the declared party preferences of the
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readers. Thus the Star, whose readers are predominantly Labour supporters,
took an aggressively anti-Labour editorial stance. For this reason, the press
have been viewed by many as instruments of ideological indoctrination, in
the service of the wealthiest and most powerful of Britain’s political parties.
Chinks in the armour, such as the Financial Times’ tentative endorsement of
the Labour Party in 1992, were viewed as the exceptions which proved the
rule. Events since 1992 have challenged that perception, however. For
reasons which I discuss in more detail elsewhere (McNair, 2000), the ‘Tory
press’, as it was once quite justifiably described, began to shift its editorial
allegiances after 1994. Sleaze (moral and political – the cash-for-questions
scandal mainly concerned Tory MPs) surrounding the governing party; the
emergence of a remodelled Labour Party with the election of Tony Blair as
leader in 1994; and Labour’s sustained courting of the press in the run-up to
the 1997 poll, all contributed to a structure of editorial bias which was
almost the exact reverse of that prevailing in 1992 (see Table 4.2). This time,
only seven daily and Sunday titles urged their readers to vote for the
Conservatives, while eleven backed Labour. The Sun and the Star in
particular, both traditionally Tory ‘cheerleaders’, came out for Labour.
In the 2001 general election Labour received the editorial support of
newspapers commanding 56 per cent of national daily circulation, while
winning only 42 per cent of the vote. The Conservatives won 32.7 per cent
of the vote, but only 7.6 per cent of national press support. In contrast to the
pattern of affiliation observed before the emergence of New Labour, editorial
bias appeared to be working to the benefit of the left rather than the right
(McNair, 2002). In the election of 2005, although the imbalance was less
pronounced, a similar pattern of pro-Labour bias was evident. This
phenomenon did not survive the resurgence of the Conservative Party under
the leadership of David Cameron, or the departure of Tony Blair from prime
ministerial office. In late 2009, as a UK general election approached and the
popularity of the Labour Party under Gordon Brown’s leadership was at a
low ebb, the leading UK red top the Sun declared its editorial support for the

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