‘I can’t believe The Sun’s gone so far…’
Yesterday I looked at the 40% decline in coverage of climate change in the UK national press between May 2007 and May 2008 due, most probably, to coverage of the credit crunch. While that was disappointing, today I’m taking a closer look at some of the specific coverage of climate change in May 2008, starting with the The Sun, and its Arctic blog.
Launched on April 22nd and running through to May 12th, The Sun newspaper’s Arctic blog heralded the step change for tabloid coverage of the environment that has happened in the last couple of years. From publishing just six headline stories from Oct 2000 to Nov 2006 directly about climate change, according to research conducted by Neil Gavin at the University of Liverpool, The Sun (and News of the World) published more headline stories in the first five months of this year, mainly in its Go Green section. In May this year alone, climate change or global warming received 44 mentions.
Benn’s ok, but not everyone is happy
And many of these mentions have accepted climate change is real, happening, and that we need to change behaviours. In fact, the Sun’s done so well, it’s congratulating itself (not a surprise there) quoting Environment Minister Hilary Benn for ‘leading the charge’ on climate change.
It hasn’t come without some fallout. Of the 26 comments on the article announcing the launch, over 95% were hostile to the idea of climate change, one even going so far as to claim:
I cant believe a paper like the Sun has been taken in so readily by the Global Warming Enthusiasts.
Although it may not seem far to go for many, The Sun’s coverage is, I feel, a bit of a landmark for the 3.15m people who bought a copy every day in May 2008. So what were they reading?
Credit crunch hits coverage of climate change
Headline coverage of climate change in the UK national press has dropped by over 40% since May 2007.
In May 2007, 103 headline stories in the top 20 UK newspapers carried either ‘climate change’ or ‘global warming’ or ‘Kyoto Protocol’ in the title. In May 2008, that figure had dropped to 59.
One month’s statistics could be a blip, of course, so I took a look at the whole of 2008 so far, in comparison with 2007. These are the results, first January-May 2007:
And then January - May 2008:
You can see that for these five months, the best month in 2008 (March, with 79) doesn’t even come close to the worst month in 2007 (May, with 103). While the Guardian has maintained a trend of near every day reporting, other titles have reduced their coverage. Of course quantity is not the same as quality, responsible or positive coverage. I’ll get to this in my later posts this week (tomorrow on The Sun; and you’ll be surprised about how much and how positive…). But in numbers, coverage is falling. And the trend is generally downwards.
So what’s happening? Read more
