South Thanet, where Ukip leader is bidding to become an MP, receives almost 50% more coverage than Nick Clegg’s seat, research finds

The South Thanet constituency where Nigel Farage is bidding to become an MP has been mentioned far more by news organisations online since the start of the year than any other parliamentary seat in the UK.

The constituency was mentioned in 308 articles, almost 50% more than Nick Clegg’s Sheffield Hallam constituency and almost three times more than David Cameron’s seat in Witney, according to analysis by the Media Standards Trust.

There has been speculation that Clegg could lose his seat as support for the Lib Dems plummets.

Constituencies with big-name sitting MPs or candidates got significantly more mentions in the press between 5 January and 19 April than the average of 12 across all 650 seats.

However, Ed Miliband’s constituency was mentioned far less – just 43 times – making it the 28th most-mentioned.

Impact of big-name politicians on press coverage of constituencies

Gordon, where former SNP leader Alex Salmond is running, was the third most-mentioned constituency with 156 mentions.

Kensington & Chelsea, the safe Tory seat where Malcolm Rifkind is the sitting MP, came in as the fifth most-mentioned. Rifkind was in the papers at the start of the year after being exposed alongside Jack Straw for offering his services to a private firm for cash. The seat is also one of the most affluent in the UK.

The two seats where Conservative MPs defected to Ukip, Douglas Carswell’s Clacton and Mark Reckless’ Rochester & Strood, got 80 and 79 mentions respectively.

The constituencies of London mayor Boris Johnson, who is running in Uxbridge & South Ruislip, and former Green party leader Caroline Lucas, who is fighting to retain the party’s only seat in Brighton, both made it into the top 20 in terms of mentions.

The constituencies of both Rochdale and Rotherham also appear relatively high up the list despite the lack of high-profile candidates, due in part to the recent child abuse allegations in the area.

Despite their crucial role in deciding who forms the next government, many marginals got very little coverage. The average across the 100 top marginal seats in 2010 was 17 compared with 12 across all seats, and five marginals were not mentioned once.

“We suspected going in that the marginals would get a lot of coverage, but while there are a lot at the top there are also a lot further down the list,” said Media Standards Trust research fellow Gordon Ramsay. “Part of the reason we are doing this is that there are large areas of the country that are receiving very little coverage, even during a national election campaign.”

The trust looked at about 4,800 articles on national newspaper websites and those of the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Sky News, Huffington Post UK and Buzzfeed UK Politics.