The media, as always, played a huge part in influencing voters in the run up to this year’s general election and was arguably more partisan than ever before. But just how much influence do newspapers really have on their readers?
According to a YouGov study, 64% of Daily Telegraph readers, unsurprisingly, said that they would vote Conservative compared to just 10% who said the same for Labour, while a 73% Labour-weighted readership makes the Mirror/Daily Record the most left-wing paper in terms of voting intention.
Interestingly, the Mirror/Record is fairly evenly split in its Conservative and UKIP support (8% and 7%, respectively).
While almost half of Express readers said that they would vote for a Cameron-led government, just over a quarter (27%) would vote UKIP. The Daily Star (23%) and The Sun (21%) were the only other newspapers with notable UKIP backing. The Daily Star was also the only newspaper to flag up BNP support – although at a lowly 1%.
Surprisingly, 27% of Sun readers refused to be swayed by the tabloid’s Miliband-bashing and said they would vote Labour; however, unsurprisingly, 42% are loyal Tories.
Sticking to their left-wing guns, six in 10 Guardian readers said that they would vote Labour – significantly more than Conservative (4%) and UKIP (1%).
Guardian readers (21%), alongside those of the Independent (17%), were the only newspapers with significant Green support; however, the Tory/Lib Dem coalition-backing Indy still has a readership weighted towards Labour (46%).
Unsurprisingly, 61% of The Herald (Glasgow) readers said they would vote SNP. None would vote for the Lib Dems.
Overall, British newspaper readers are split between Labour (35%) and Conservative (34%) – followed by UKIP (13%), ‘other’ (11%) and Lib Dem (8%).
