Voters in Wales failed by inaccurate UK media reports on devolved issues, study finds | Media
The UK media is failing to adequately report on devolved issues in Wales, leaving voters poorly informed about the Senedd elections in May, a report has claimed.
A Cardiff University study of more than 3,000 news articles found repeated trends in media coverage across different broadcasters and platforms, including failure to indicate whether a story was only about England or England and Wales, generalized references to “government” rather than “the UK government”, and the use of “you” and “your” in contexts that only apply to people living in England.
Lead researcher Professor Stephen Cushion said reporting that did not differentiate between the UK’s devolved governments neglected the constitutional needs of the public.
“When you say ‘the government is building more houses, setting targets, changing the way people get doctor’s appointments’, those are different systems and a lot of that is invisible in British news,” he said. “A good example is the junior [resident] doctors’ strikes, or a very popular TikTok explainer on V levels, talking about “how your education evolves”.
“The survey accompanying the research found that there is still a lot of confusion in Wales about which policy areas are devolved. News reported in England is perceived by viewers as being at UK level, and this impacts on how people vote.”
Almost three quarters (73%) of social media posts from the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5 and Sky News did not specify whether the story was about England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, the study found, along with 57% of TV news and 35% of online articles.
According to the report, media inaccuracy has contributed to widespread uncertainty in Wales on policy issues: 26 years after devolution began, a third of those surveyed still did not know that health and education were devolved to the Welsh Government.
Just 1% correctly identified whether Cardiff Bay or Westminster were responsible for eight policy areas, and just 7% of people knew May’s vote would be held under a new closed list system, according to the representative poll of 1,544 people, conducted by YouGov alongside Cardiff University’s news analysis.
A similar poll in Scotland in 2021 found higher levels of understanding of devolved powers and decision-making than in Wales, which Cushion attributed to Scotland’s healthier media environment.
British media remains the main source of news for many in Wales, the report found: 46% of respondents rely on British news most often, compared to 10% who rely mainly on news produced in Wales.
This breaks down along political lines: 60% of Reform voters said they mainly used British news sources, a higher proportion than those who voted for other parties. A third of Plaid Cymru voters said they relied mainly on UK news, while 46% said they used British and Welsh sources equally, and 18% relied mainly on Wales-specific sources.
Cushion said: “It could be that people are voting on issues that affect England, because campaign events in England, and particularly involving the Nigel Farage versus Keir Starmer dynamic, are getting more coverage… But if you live in Wales, these elections have nothing to do with that.
“There is a huge communication problem here, and that is important for democratic accountability.”
