Which media holds the most political influence?

TV was the dominant medium in the 2010 general election campaigns, but this time round the most important single influence could be newspapers, writes Raymond Snoddy.

Last time round the dominant medium in the general election campaign was clearly television through the Prime Ministerial debates. They grabbed attention, attracted huge audiences and pushed Nick Clegg from near public anonymity to centre-stage and helped to make him a credible deputy-Prime Minister in the coalition to come.

By comparison social media had an amplifying effect, almost a walk-on role, compared with the power of live television.

This time round the most important single influence could be newspapers, not because such influence over voting intentions is so great – more because the margins appear so fine and it could take very little impact to nudge matters in a particular direction.

Record numbers have yet to make up their mind and there is additional confusion because of the number of small parties cluttering up the decision-making process.

In the face of an increasingly clear choice between the economic visions of Labour and Conservatives, newspapers could guide a significant number of voters away from the far fringes of parties such as UKIP using the tried and tested “wasted vote” theory.

Most nationals, through the usual process of osmosis, will, of course, come out firmly for the Conservatives.

Yet national newspapers could still end up as a centralising force in favour of Ed Miliband or David Cameron, though not one that will have much impact on the disaffected nationalists north of the border.

Newspapers will have a larger influence, though not in any crude, rather ludicrous, Sun Wot Won It sense, because Cameron has managed to neuter the Prime Ministerial debates and turn them into a very modest thing. At least he was lucky with the lots and won the last speaking slot in the one debate he has agreed to appear in.

With the election campaign only just officially launched we can already see the appearance of the eternal verities of newspaper politics.

The Daily Mail, while doing important investigations on the selling on of supposedly private pension and medical data, has already thrown any attempt at fairness to the winds.

While Labour “claims” are subjected to rigorous scrutiny, the Tory performance gets the triumphalist treatment under the headline “The Magnificent Seven.”

One wonders how they will cope with the latest economic news that the economy actually showed serious signs of slowing down in the first quarter of this year. Have they got a small enough typeface for that sort of information?

Years ago the Daily Mail splashed on a slightly re-jigged Tory press release “Ten Labour Lies”, most of which eventually turned out to be true.

The Daily Telegraph is not nicknamed “the Torygraph” for nothing and naturally splashed on a letter from more than 100 industrialists supporting the Conservatives – which most businessmen and industrialists do most of the time anyway.

Here the wit and wisdom of Twitter can be relied on to redress the balance within seconds. An alternative Telegraph front page headline quickly read “Tax Dodgers, Tory Donors and non-Doms: Labour threatens Britain’s recovery.”

The Times, as it usually does, has been more measured and less strident, though it will be interesting to see whether this survives right up to 7 May.

The Times perfectly and properly reported the Conservative claim that every working family would face £3,000 a year increased tax bill as a result of Labour’s proposals. But it also went on to give prominence to the fact that independent experts had forced Cameron to admit that the £3,000 figure had been little more than a guess.

The important role for newspapers, at least for those prepared to contemplate doing so, is to subject the claims of all politicians to scrutiny.

Channel 4 News already has its fact checkers and the PM programme has brought in the excellent Tim Harford and his More Or Less team to try to prevent listeners from being bamboozled by dodgy numbers from dodgy politicians.

Interestingly The Times, both from political specialists and in a Tuesday leader, has praised the role of Clegg and the Lib Dems for helping to make the UK’s first coalition government for 65 years work so well. Maybe it wasn’t such a bad system of government after all.

In a rational world, The Times implied such a coalition or even a Labour-Lib Dem version might not be such a bad idea.

Alas it’s unlikely to be. The headline on the leader was: “Goodbye to All That.”

Whatever newspapers say, those who dislike the Conservatives will take revenge on the Lib-Dems for enabling five years of the Cameron Government. Clegg personally will not be easily forgiven for promising to oppose the increase in student fees and then going along with it – even though such a volte face is just the small change of the realities of power.

Cameron promised he would not increase VAT rates and immediately did.

At least we now know where the journalism – as opposed to newspaper vote – should go.

Rather belatedly, Nick Clegg has proposed a new right to protect journalism from state interference. The proposal will also suggest that the heads of broadcasting regulatory bodies should be appointed independently rather than by ministers.

Too late, Nick. Unless the electoral arithmetic breaks in the most optimistic way for the Lib-Dems, the British equivalent of the US first amendment to the constitution could remain a long way off.

Whatever the influence of newspapers and media over the six-week campaign, if the polls are right and remain right, then the most intriguing prospect beckons.

Lots and lots of great news stories as either Ed Miliband, or more probably because of the electoral map and events in Scotland, David Cameron try to run government without an overall majority.

There could be a period of great political instability with loose multi-party alliances if not coalitions, which will be great for journalists and cartoonists, if not the value of the pound.

Some are even predicting a bloodbath of the leaders of the three main political parties with their replacements forced to fight anther general election in the autumn.

What fun. What leaks. What headlines.