Abstract
This chapter focuses on three specific policy issue disputes in the media coverage of the election campaign to examine the role that fact-checking plays in informing debate. Applying methodological tools from political discourse analysis and argumentation theory, it finds that fact-checking is effective at resolving disputes over empirical claims, even where both are statistically defensible, by interpreting which is most contextually relevant. However, checking the empirical circumstances did not resolve political arguments over conflicting policy proposals, as claims for action to reach an agreed goal, which hinge on claims about causal relationships. On the most complex and controversial issues, fact-checkers often chose to check banal and uncontested statements, rather than assess the difficult but important evidence behind theoretical, predictive claims.
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- 1.
Labour launched their manifesto on 16 May 2017 after a draft was leaked the previous week and the Conservatives on 18 May 2017.
- 2.
According to a Nexis search, the term ‘school funding crisis’ appeared in The Guardian’s education supplement in January 2017, in the Independent the following month, and the Mirror in March. Even the highly conservative Express used the term in a headline in April 2017, shortly before the election was called.
- 3.
Angela Raynor was asked about Brexit and Tim Farron was pressed on horserace issues related to a hypothetical ‘progressive coalition,’ assumed then to be the only chance of defeating the Conservatives.
- 4.
Both fact-checkers also detailed further cost pressures specified in the source reports that weren’t discussed in the media content, such as increases to National Insurance (a form of income tax to fund and determine eligibility for state benefits) the minimum wage, and a new ‘apprentice levy’ on businesses, on which they can also draw to fund apprentices, but of which schools were not in a position to make use.
- 5.
Alistair Campbell, Downing Street Press Secretary and Director of Communication for Labour Prime Minister under Tony Blair, 1997–2003.
- 6.
The interview, with Nick Ferrari on London’s LBC Radio, 02/05/2017, was described in much of the news reporting as ‘car crash,’ in other words, as compellingly awful.
- 7.
A soundbite line used by the Conservatives, assuming that Labour stood no chance of forming a government on their own.
- 8.
He specifically mentions the clip shown on Channel 4 News, but is vague about how he came to see it: “when I had a look back at the footage …”
- 9.
Another Labour MP, Yvette Cooper, similarly said that “you can’t ever provide precise links […] and it would be inappropriate and wrong to do so,” but also asserted that “we do know” that community policing helps to gather intelligence and prevent radicalisation (Today, 05/06/2017).
- 10.
Reality Check (RC39, 26/05/2017) put it at 18,991 (rounded to 19,000) using the most recent data from September 2010 to September 2016. FactCheck (FC21, 05/06/2017) put it at 19,668 in FC15 (close to Labour’s 20,000) using slightly older March 2010 to March 2016 figures. Full Fact’s (FF33, 05/06/2017) figure was 21,000 mixing the two from March 2010 to September 2016.
- 11.
Full Fact (FF33, 05/06/2017) put the drop at over 1300 (March 2010 to March 2016) and FactCheck (FC15 26/05/2017) at 1014 (‘When the Tories took office’ to March 2016), but they reported the same figure of 640 officers who had recently completed their training and begun active duty from the National Police Chiefs’ Council, though they were not yet reflected in the official statistics. The two fact-checkers therefore put the net change from 2010 at 700 and 374, respectively.
- 12.
Because Remain campaigners omitted caveats and overstated the certainty of predictions, especially specific figures rather than the broad direction, fact-checks conversely focused on the limitations of economic forecasting. Although this answers, in part, the ‘evidence’ critical question for appeals to expertise, knowing that economic models are only as good as the data and assumptions input, is only helpful if those details are provided for the specific studies cited. Another critical question relates to credibility, but the record for accuracy of economic forecasting was not set out (Birks 2019: 256).
- 13.
Conservative MP James Cleverly (Channel 4 News, 01/06/2017) argued that threatening ‘no deal’ was a pragmatic negotiating tactic, but seemed to pull back from actually suggesting that she would walk away from a bad deal, saying instead that she would to try to renegotiate, yet still portrayed the effectively similar Labour argument that it was important to seek a deal as having “admit[ted] defeat before the negotiations have started” (Cleverly, Channel 4 News, 01/06/2017).
FactChecks
FC02, 10/05/2017, FactCheck, ‘The school funding crisis (Q&A)’ https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-qa-the-school-funding-crisis
FC10, 19/05/2017, FactCheck, ‘What’s the difference between the Tories, Labour and Lib Dems?: Brexit’ https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-whats-the-difference-between-the-tories-labour-and-lib-dems
FC15, 26/05/2017, FactCheck, ‘Are Tory cuts to police budgets the reason we need troops on the streets?’ https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/are-tory-cuts-to-police-budgets-the-reason-we-need-troops-on-the-streets
FC18, 30/05/2017, FactCheck, ‘Corbyn on Northern Ireland’ https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-corbyn-on-northern-ireland
FC21, 05/06/2017, FactCheck, ‘Jeremy Corbyn is right: the Tories have cut 20,000 police officers since 2010’ https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/jeremy-corbyn-is-right-the-tories-have-cut-20000-police-officers-since-2010
FF25, 18/05/2017, Full Fact, ‘Conservative Manifesto: Leaving the single market’ https://fullfact.org/europe/conservative-manifesto-2017-leaving-single-market/
FF33, 05/06/2017, Full Fact, ‘Have armed police numbers been cut?’ https://fullfact.org/crime/have-armed-police-numbers-been-cut/
RC04, 21/04/2017, Reality Check, ‘How many children are in classes of more than 30?’ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-39666686
RC09, 02/05/2017, Reality Check, ‘Are there 20,000 fewer police?’ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-39779288
RC11, 05/05/2017, Reality Check, ‘Is crime up or down under the Tories?’ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-39817100
RC18, 11/05/2017, Reality Check, ‘What does ‘hard Brexit’ mean for UK?’ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-39858788
RC39, 26/05/2017, Reality Check, ‘Why does the Prevent strategy divide opinion?’ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-40060325
RC53, 31/05/2017, Reality Check, ‘Confidence in Corbyn’ [on blogroll] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/topics/cp7r8vgl2rgt/reality-check#main-content
RC54, 31/05/2017, Reality Check, ‘Corbyn: “300,000 voted for me to lead party”’ [on blogroll] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/topics/cp7r8vgl2rgt/reality-check#main-content
RC57, 01/06/2017, Reality Check, ‘May and Corbyn’s record on anti-terror legislation’ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-40111329
Tweets
FCT36, 29/05/2017, https://twitter.com/FactCheck/status/869289624950231040
FCT46, 31/05/2017, https://twitter.com/FactCheck/status/869979122273062912
RCT011, 02/05/2017, https://twitter.com/BBCRealityCheck/status/859394476078497794
RCT055, 31/05/2017, https://twitter.com/BBCRealityCheck/status/869998129810096128
RCT061, 31/05/2017, https://twitter.com/BBCRealityCheck/status/870006425195606016
RCT062, 31/05/2017, https://twitter.com/BBCRealityCheck/status/870006716540125185
RCT115, 04/06/2017, https://twitter.com/BBCRealityCheck/status/871504547465900033
RCT137, 05/06/2017, https://twitter.com/BBCRealityCheck/status/871975321582678016
RCT156, 06/06/2017, https://twitter.com/BBCRealityCheck/status/872186707835334659
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Department for Education. 2017. ‘Justine Greening Statement to Parliament on School Funding’, House of Commons, Accessed 21 December 2018. https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/justine-greening-statement-to-parliament-on-school-funding.
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National Audit Office. 2016. ‘Financial Sustainability of Schools’, Accessed 21 December 2018. https://www.nao.org.uk/report/financial-sustainability-in-schools/#.
Ridge-Newman, Anthony. 2019. ‘“Strong and Stable” to “Weak and Wobbly”: The Conservative Election Campaign.’ In Dominic Wring, Roger Mortimore and Simon Atkinson (eds.), Political Communication in Britain (Palgrave Macmillan: London).
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Birks, J. (2019). The Role of Fact-Checking in Political Argumentation. In: Fact-Checking Journalism and Political Argumentation. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-30573-4_4
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