"...this may backfire by pushing at least some voters to the BNP and other small parties, as well as contributing to large-scale public resentment..."
In last night’s debate, the first question put to the three main party leaders was about immigration. Based on the responses, the differences between the parties on this issue are likely to be perceived as relatively marginal. All three argued for controls on migration. Gordon Brown emphasised the recent controls that his government put in place based on a points system and pointed out that net migration had already been declining in the past couple of years. David Cameron claimed that immigration was still too high and needed to be reduced further and that his party would introduce an immigration cap, as well as reforming the border policing system. Thus, while his approach is more restrictive than Brown’s (Brown is opposed to an arbitrary cap), there is also no (or little) attempt to appeal to potential far-right voters in any of what he said.
Perhaps ironically, Nick Clegg’s policy – to allow migrants only to go to regions that need them economically – is an approach with the potential to be the most restrictive. Spain’s 1985 Foreigners’ Law, which introduced similar additional regional/provincial bureaucratic processes for legal entry into Spain to work, has been claimed to encourage illegal migration because the legal procedures were so onerous. It also potentially resembles old guest-worker policies in places like Germany, where labour migrants were tied to a particular job and were not allowed to work for other employers once they had been granted entry into Germany.
Despite this early discussion of immigration in the debate last night, it is clear that, as predicted, none of the three wished to make immigration a key issue. It was not mentioned in any of their opening or closing statements. Rather than ‘playing the immigration card’, Cameron in particular (but the other two leaders as well) focused on the technical details of immigration policy, with none arguing for an immediate halt to migration.
Yet immigration was the second most important issue after the economy mentioned by British citizens in the March Ipsos Mori poll. As argued previously, ignoring the issue like this may backfire by pushing at least some voters to the BNP and other small parties, as well as contributing to large-scale public resentment at a political class that seems unwilling to address one of the issues that has been of major concern to the British public in the past decade.
"Yet the internet and social networking sites remain poor relations when it comes to political communication..."
One thing you might not have noticed about Labour’s first two election broadcasts of this campaign: there were no politicians. The first consisted of a man facing a crossroads played by one of Britain’s more accomplished actors, with a voice-over from a former Dr Who. The second consisted of Eddie Izzard. But there was not a glimpse of Gordon Brown, Alistair Darling, Harriet Harman, or anyone else from Westminster.
This, in fact, has been the pattern for party election broadcasts since the 1980s, which is perhaps why the absence of politicians did not give rise to any comment. Occasionally a party might give viewers soap opera-style insights into their leader’s background and private life. What was dubbed ‘Kinnock: the Movie’ set that particular template, being so effective Labour showed it twice during the 1987 campaign. But these are rarities, and no one is expecting Labour to give Brown the Hollywood treatment this time.
The British Film Institute is now showing examples of ten past election broadcasts on its screenonline website, with introductions written by Philip Cowley and myself. What you will see there is how far their character has been transformed, from what (to modern eyes) are fairly tedious and incredibly long, straight-to-camera addresses to the pocket dramas we now take for granted.
The first election broadcasts were transmitted in 1951, when there were only 750,000 sets in the country, concentrated in affluent homes in South East England. This is why Labour’s first go consisted of two of its posher members making a pitch for the middle class vote, safe in the knowledge that no workers were watching. The broadcast also contained the first example of a rabid rebuttal, when Christopher Mayhew delicately corrected what he assured viewers were the undoubtedly honest mistakes contained in Sir Anthony Eden’s broadcast for the Conservatives the previous evening.
For a time, political commentators credited election broadcasts with a profound sway over voters' minds; by the mid-1960s the consensus was that they did not play a decisive role in changing voting intentions, although they might reinforce them. Sometimes, they could actually harm a party’s chances – as when the ‘war of Jennifer’s Ear’ derailed Labour’s 1992 campaign.
In our multi-channel world, the importance of the election broadcast has probably diminished: they are very easy to avoid these days. Perhaps one reason why the main parties have agreed to participate in the leaders' debates is because they need newer means to engage the voters.
The television producer Peter Bazalgette recently argued that now each party has its own YouTube channel, election broadcasts were redundant. He proposed that if the parties wanted to make their case on television they should pay the commercial rate. I am sure ITV would like the extra revenue. It is certainly notable that Labour first showed its broadcast this campaign on Youtube before they were shown on TV. Yet the internet and social networking sites remain poor relations when it comes to political communication. An insight into the changing nature of how the parties try to appeal to the people, the party election broadcast looks likely to stay with us for a few more elections yet.
"It might be tempting to dismiss this strategic shift as political opportunism and move on, but there are good reasons to take the BNP’s embrace of Islamophobia seriously. "
As Nick Griffin made clear in one interview this week, Islam remains a top issue for the BNP during the election. Like similar parties elsewhere in Europe, the BNP has increasingly shifted its discourse away from the crude ‘anti-black’ racism of its predecessors toward placing much stronger emphasis on Islamophobia. The BNP first launched its ‘Campaign against Islam’ in the hours following the terrorist attacks of September 11th 2001. Griffin has since recruited sympathizers within the Sikh community to communicate the party’s position on Islam to voters, such as during the BNP’s election broadcast for the 2004 European elections.
It might be tempting to dismiss this strategic shift as political opportunism and move on, but there are good reasons to take the BNP’s embrace of Islamophobia seriously.
Our study of BNP voting – ‘Angry White Men’ – provides evidence that Griffin’s party recruits higher levels of support in constituencies which have a large Muslim community. Moreover, we find that the presence of non-Muslim Asians has no significant effect on BNP voting and that support for the BNP is actually lower in areas with large black populations (nor are we the only researchers in Europe who find this relationship). The point is that the drivers of support for the far right are changing and becoming more complex. As we argue in our study, the appeal of Griffin’s BNP is more subtle than the crude racism and xenophobia of the old 1970s National Front.
The ‘traditional’ approach to the far right has been to talk tough on immigration and undercut its support (as with the classic reference to Thatcher saying voters are feeling ‘swamped’ about immigration). But branding the BNP simply as “anti-immigrant” misses the point and won’t appease the modern day BNP voter who is driven by a diverse array of concerns over perceived threats to ‘British’ values and culture. Anti-immigrant the party is, but in some parts of the country the BNP is also successfully mobilizing intolerance toward Muslim communities. These communities are already settled and are not going anywhere which means that it is going to be much more difficult for mainstream elites and policy makers to formulate a coherent and convincing response to the far right.
Talking tough about limits on immigration is one thing; talking about voters’ concerns over communities which are already established and which contribute to social and political life is another matter altogether. As Lauren McLaren notes in an earlier entry, in this election the mainstream parties are unlikely to thrust immigration to the forefront of their campaigns, but they are even less likely to talk about concerns over Muslims and Islam.
As I discuss in my forthcoming book, aside from coinciding with the increased salience of immigration the rise of the BNP has also taken place amidst a broader pool of anxiety and concern among voters over the role of Muslims and Islam in wider society.
At the time of Griffin’s breakthrough into the European Parliament last summer one poll by YouGov suggested that 44 per cent of voters agreed with the statement that ‘even in its milder forms Islam poses a danger to Western civilization’. The most recent British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey similarly suggests a reservoir of latent support for parties which specifically adopt hostile positions toward this minority group, indicating that only around one out of four voters have positive views toward Islam and five out of ten would be ‘bothered’ if a large Mosque sprung up in their local community.
As elsewhere on the continent, this anti-Muslim ‘frame’ is an important tool for the BNP because unlike its earlier emphasis on anti-Semitism arguments about the alleged ‘threat’ posed by Islam have support among sections of British media and the political establishment. In turn, the far right’s message is being delivered amidst a climate which is more favourable and might inadvertently legitimize this message in the eyes of voters.
Take, for example, the invitation to Geert Wilders last month to show his anti-Islam ‘Fitna’ film to members of the House of Lords, or coverage of Muslims in sections of the tabloid press. Few mainstream outlets endorsed anti-Semitism in the 1970s but today we don’t have to look too far to find support for Islamophobia – and BNP voters are much likely to read the Daily Mail, Daily Express or The Sun than other papers.
It is for all of these reasons that Griffin is working hard to claim ownership over the anti-Islam issue. Most voters remain unconvinced by Griffin and still hold extremely negative views toward the party. His Question Time debut was generally seen as a disaster, with only 4 per cent of voters afterward saying they would “definitely consider” voting BNP. But it is also for these reasons that it would be mistaken to overlook the changing message of the far right and ignore deeper currents within public opinion on which the party is preying.
Yesterday I pointed out how the polls had been remarkably stable during the campaign, despite talk of their ‘volatility’, once you allowed for the margin of error inherent in sampling. Up till then, all but one poll during the campaign had put the Conservatives on 37 +/-3, Labour on 30 +/-3.
Since then we’ve had three more national polls. YouGov had 41/32/18. ComRes had 35/29/21. And Harris had 36/27/23. Fairly obviously, one of these – the YouGov poll – doesn’t fit into that earlier pattern, because it has the Conservatives on 41.
But it’s still hardly evidence of any great shift. It just means that over the last week every poll has had the Conservatives on 38+/-3 (rather than 37) and every poll has still had Labour on 30+/-3. Indeed, this is true of every poll since the campaign began.
"So what happens when we compare the Conservative and Labour manifestos?"
Manifestos not only inform us about the sorts of issues which parties consider important at the election, they also provide crucial insights into how the parties think about these issues. You can get some sense of an answer to these questions can be gained from reading the manifestos carefully, a more systematic approach is to analyse the text of the manifestos in order to determine the types of words that they use to describe their positions – as explained here.
So what happens when we compare the Conservative and Labour manifestos? Some differences between the manifestos are immediately apparent. The most obvious difference is that Conservatives are more likely to use words that relate to chaos (such as ‘disorder’, ‘ruin’, ‘wild’, etc.) than Labour (112% more uses). The Conservatives are also more likely to use words relating to ‘restraint’ (‘control’, ‘discipline’, ‘halt’, etc.) than Labour (32% more uses). This may not be surprising given the Conservative’s ‘broken Britain’ claims. What may be more surprising is that Labour are more likely than the Conservatives to use words relating to ‘moral imperatives’ – such as ‘duty’, ‘law’, ‘principles’ (22% more uses).
Labour are also more likely to use words relating to ‘growth’ and ‘height’ (60% more uses). A plausible interpretation of this suggests that this is a result of Labour attempting to play up its record on producing economic growth. Strengthening the case for this interpretation is Labour’s greater usage of words relating to ‘time’ (‘past’, ‘decade’, ‘time’, etc.) (40% more uses). Contrasting with this is the Conservative focus upon words relating to rank orders (‘consistent’, ‘original’, ‘rank’, etc.) (25% more uses) – almost certainly relating to a pessimistic view of Britain in a comparative setting.
Finally, and importantly, the Conservatives are more likely to use words relating to ‘abstract thought’ (‘belief’, ‘choice’, ‘plan’, etc.) than Labour (25% more uses). This suggests a Conservative manifesto built more upon an ideologically driven vision of the future and a Labour manifesto built more upon past facts.
All of the above differences are statistically significant at the 95% level, and comparisons in word usage have been standardised for the different length of manifestos. Unstandardised, the Conservative manifesto is 28768 words in length. The Labour manifesto is 30517 words.
And before any Lib Dems complain, analysis of their manifesto will follow.
"Filipino voters expect to be ‘charmed and entertained’ by their candidates. Surely UK elections would be less tedious if we demanded the same? Gordon Brown, take note..."
In the Guardian recently Hadley Freeman wrote that UK elections are so boring that they might lead people to ‘self-lobotomise with a spoon’. Her comparison was with US - long and tempestuous, and UK - short and boring - elections.
The Philippines, which is due to hold presidential elections on 10 May 2010, just days after UK voters cast their ballots, gives us another, and perhaps more interesting, point of comparison.
The opening of the presidential race on 9 February 2010 was heralded by The Philippines Daily Enquirer as being like the beginning of a carnival.
And our Gordon might want to take note of the tactics of their Gordon: Richard (Dick) Gordon, a candidate for the Philippines presidential race.
Gordon, a former Senator, is not likely to win the race but he is having a lot of fun trying. Gordon and his running mate Bayani Fernando campaign as 'political transformers’ and have a transformers-branded truck as a campaign vehicle.
Gordon’s campaign was also boosted by his performance with the comedy duo Moymoy Palaboy in which they lip sync their way through the song The Lion Sleeps Tonight.
The video for this performance went viral and had received over 50,000 hits within just three days of being loaded up to Youtube.
Gordon, who has admitted that he has little money for advertising his presidential bid, must be delighted with the free publicity. Filipino voters expect to be ‘charmed and entertained’ by their candidates. Surely UK elections would be less tedious if we demanded the same? Gordon Brown, take note.
"Most people involved in politics know about sampling error, but, as last night, they often forget its implications."
There were four opinion polls last night, all showing different sized-Conservative leads, ranging from 3 to 10 points. Cue confusion, and lots of talk about the polls being ‘all over the place’.
In fact, it’s dead easy to explain, and the polls are actually behaving remarkably stably.
Each opinion poll has a sampling error, an acceptance that sampling 1000 or so people is not going to produce an absolute accurate measure of the views of 40 or so million.
That sampling error is usually reported along with the poll – at least by the more responsible news outlets – and it is (usually) +/- three percentage points.
And every poll last night showed the Conservatives on 37, plus or minus 3. (Actually, every poll last night showed them on 37, plus or minus 2). And every poll last night showed Labour on 30, plus or minus 3.
In fact, with one exception right at the beginning of the campaign, every poll during the campaign has shown the same: the Conservatives on 37, plus or minus 3, and Labour on 30, plus or minus 3.
The veteran pollster Bob Worcester has one key maxim: focus on the share, not the lead, and he’s spot on. Most people involved in politics know about sampling error (anyone still puzzled, there’s a good simple summary here), but, as last night, they often forget its implications.
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