Exclusive: Research finds 95% of tabloid’s editorials in runup to election have been anti-Labour, with most of those directly vilifying the Labour leader

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

The Sun has been more virulently opposed to the Labour party and its leader Ed Miliband than it was in the runup to the 1992 election when Neil Kinnock was famously portrayed in a lightbulb on polling day, a study shows.



Research by the Media Standards Trust found that 95% of the leader columns in Rupert Murdoch’s tabloid were anti-Labour ahead of Thursday’s general election, compared with 79% that were judged anti-Labour in 1992.

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The research came as David Axelrod, the American political consultant and Obama adviser who has been working for Labour during this campaign, said that the Tory press in the UK is more powerful and “much more aggressive” than Fox News in the US.

The Media Standards Trust found 77% of the News UK paper’s leaders were anti-Miliband, against 44% that were deemed anti-Kinnock in 1992, when the paper was edited by Kelvin MacKenzie and told its readers: “If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights.”

The paper later claimed “It’s the Sun wot won it” after John Major’s Conservatives beat Kinnock.

In its analysis of leader columns from 26 March to 3 May this year, the Media Standards Trust, a research body and thinktank, said 37 out of 39 Sun leaders were anti-Labour, with 30 of them anti-Miliband.

This compares with 1992, when it said 31 out of 39 leaders were anti-Labour, with 17 of them anti-Kinnock.



Of the same 39 leader columns in the Sun, the Media Standards Trust said 18 of them (46%) were in favour of David Cameron’s Conservatives, against 33% that were pro-Tory in 1992.

Rupert Murdoch is said to have berated journalists on the Sun for not doing enough to stop Labour winning the election and warned of the consequences of a Miliband win for the future of News UK.

Miliband has said he will take action against the amount of power wielded by Murdoch in a review of rules regulating media ownership in the UK.

A Sun leader on 24 April claimed that the threat to Murdoch’s empire was a “direct result” of the Sun switching support to the Conservatives and that “during all the years the Sun backed them … Labour said nothing about the size of our company”.

Recent Sun leaders have been headlined “Fork-ed tongue”, “Shameful Mili” and “Lefty stitch-up”.

Another was headlined “Tartan peril” although the paper supported the Scottish National party in its Scottish edition while backing the Conservatives elsewhere.

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The Media Standards Trust also looked at leader articles across all of the national newspapers.

The total number of pro-Conservative leaders (217) was more than double the pro-Labour aggregate (87).

The Daily Telegraph had most pro-Tory leaders with 55; the Daily Mail had 49, the Daily Express 36, the Sun 35 and the Times 34.



Only the Daily Mirror (55) and the Guardian (19), hit double figures with pro-Labour leaders, according to the research.

The Sun was the toughest on Labour with 102 critical leaders, followed by the Daily Mail (75) and the Telegraph (67).

The Sun, the Times and the Daily Mail were most critical of the Scottish National party, topped by 21 in the Sun. The Media Standards Trust found only one pro-SNP leader, in the Financial Times.

The Mirror had the most leaders (109) deemed anti-Conservative, followed by the Guardian (44).

The Daily Express, whose owner Richard Desmond has donated £1.3m to Ukip, ran the most leaders in favour of Nigel Farage’s party, with 11.

Axelrod said in his interview with Michael Goldfarb from Politico: “I do think the parties approach media as partisan players. So you see parties disseminating messages through the print media in a way that is unusual ...

“Here there are relationships between the parties and media outlets that are deeper so you see a lot of themes being previewed in the media in a way that you don’t see in the States.”