Media shifts focus in pre- and post- budget coverage

Less Budget coverage than CSR suggests Japan and Libyan Crises impacted coverage

According to Kantar Media, a leading provider of media research and insights, the topic most covered by the media in George Osborne's Budget announcement last week was Tax. The topic claimed 35 percent of the key topics analysed by the company as part of pre-Budget media coverage, and 38 percent post-Budget.  The second main issue discussed by the media changed from Cuts in the pre-Budget media coverage to Growth once the full budget was revealed by Osborne at 12.30 p.m. on Wednesday 23rd March, indicating that Osborne was successful in validating his pro-Growth message.

Kantar Media's researchers also found that the volume of media coverage given to the Comprehensive Spending Review in October 2010 was significantly higher than the volume of coverage around the Budget - a total number of 4788 compared to 1283 media reports in the seven days leading up to both announcements - suggesting that the British involvement in the ongoing crisis in Libya and the aftermath of the Japanese tsunami may have impacted media coverage.

Philip Lynch, Evaluation Director, Kantar Media Intelligence UK states: "This analysis of Budget coverage in the mainstream media shows that Osborne was successful in delivering a pro-growth Budget. Even though the main topic of discussion remained Tax, the second key issue covered by the media changed from Cuts and Inflation to Growth once the Budget was delivered. Monitoring how the discussion of major announcements can shift over time is as important for organisations trying to understand how their communications is impacting opinion as it is for Governments.  Our analysis of the CSR and last week's Budget indicates a distinct change in British economic priorities in the last six months."

Research highlights include:

  • In the run up to the October 2010 Comprehensive Spending Review, the media coverage was heavily focused on Cuts (32% of the key search terms within the coverage analysed and more than 3000 pieces of coverage focused on this issue) compared to 10% (and less than 1,000 pieces of coverage) that focused on Growth.
  • In the run up to the March 2011 Budget, the proportion of coverage focusing on the Cuts fell (from 32 to 17%). The focus shifted towards Tax (35%), Growth (14%) and Inflation (12%).
  • Post budget coverage highlighted a shift in the topics covered. Although tax remained the top issue of media focus due to the planned changes to income and corporation tax (38% focused on Tax), coverage of Cuts dropped to 10% and Growth became the second most discussed topic (21%). Discussions around Inflation dropped from 12% to 8% post Budget. Discussions around Interest Rates remained the same at 6%.
  • Concern about Public Services, the NHS and Education - all significant topics for discussion leading up to the Spending review - fell before and following the Budget.
  • Despite an announcement about rising Unemployment prior to the Budget, and even though the related topics of Tax, Growth and Inflation all received significantly more attention, media focus on this area remained minimal and largely the same as in October 2010 (4% in October 2010, 3% pre-Budget and 4% post Budget).

Research methodology

The objective of the research was to measure the sense of media attention around the Comprehensive Spending Review in October 2010 compared to the Budget in March 2011. For the pre-Budget and Spending Review analysis, Kantar Media analysed in total 6,071 UK media reports in the seven days leading up to both announcements. For the post Budget analysis, 1,477 media reports were analysed in the 24 hours following the Budget Statement and subsequent debate in the House of Commons.

The percentage figures are comparisons between the relative proportion of the key search terms within the media coverage analysed, and do not necessarily represent the percentage of mentions these topics received within the coverage as a whole.

Kantar Media tracked all relevant coverage published in daily national newspapers and daily paid-for regional newspapers as well as national and regional broadcast media and online newsites.