The Facts Behind That Focus Group

Last Saturday The Times gave a double page spread(£) to an 8 strong online focus group from marginal seats. The article included a number of comments from participants that were very negative towards Ed Miliband. I thought the article seemed distinctly ‘fishy’ at the time and I asked YouGov to publish their transcript and methodology to find out more. To their credit they have. My quarrel here isn’t with YouGov but with the way The Times wrote up the article.

The marginal seats in which these 8 ‘swing voters’ were drawn from were all Conservative-held constituencies. While it’s fair to describe these as marginals, a fairer representation would have included some marginal seats held by Labour and the Liberal Democrats. In fact 2 of the 8 participants were from seats where the battle was between Conservatives and Liberal Democrats where Labour didn’t have a hope of winning and only attracted 5% votes in the 2010 election!

Hardly target seats.

The first of these was from Winchester which is a Conservative seat with Liberal Democrats second. At the last election Labour only got 5.5% of the vote. Similarly another participant was from Torridge and West Devon Tory where Labour came 4th behind UKIP on 5.3% at the last election. Is it any wonder that these participants from these areas don’t instinctively feel particularly positive about a Labour leader when only 1 in 20 people in those constituencies vote Labour?

The sample of a focus group really matters because participants can lead debate throughout the course of a two hour discussion. Even with a far from helpful sample to Labour there were some interesting comments that didn’t make The Times article. The newspaper could also have picked out the following from the transcripts to write a completely different story, had it the inclination to do so. The following comments were from participants in the same focus group that was described as being so negative towards Ed Miliband:

On Nick Clegg:

“After screwing the students not to be trusted just interested in power”
“Weak… as I don’t feel he has been able to stand up to Cameron
“Good speaker but weak”
“The only leading he can do his leading them to destruction”
“Slightly pathetic like a sibling seeking approval from an elder brother – Cameron!”
“He has sacrificed the principles of his party in a naked search for power”

On Vince Cable:

“Vince Cable seemed to have some decent ideas when in opposition but has been sidelined by George Osborne and has disappeared as a major influence”

On David Cameron:

“Slimy……a toff trying to pretend to be ordinary”
“A coward in the face of Europe”
“A bit out-of-touch”
“He seems focused but maybe out of touch with a majority of the voting public”
“Not good trying to sell off everything Thatcher didn’t”
“He tries to be all things to all men, not a sign of good leadership”
“I don’t think he could relate to or empathise with most social groups”
“He talks a good talk and can deliver a speech, but that’s what he was trained to do from an early age wasn’t it?”
“One of a breed that think they are born to lead”
“Stop blaming Labour for everything. Bankers started it”
“He needs to stop blaming everyone else and take responsibility for now”

When asked about Labour’s chances three participants said:

“I think Labour would win more votes as a protest to the Coalition”
“I think Labour would win, mainly because the general consensus is that people are not happy with Conservative”
“If I were to vote I would probably vote Labour again as my life is marginally easier under Labour.”

Interestingly one participant also commented:

“I have VERY little time for newspapers and their journalists they all seem to be a pretty low level bunch of individuals”

That didn’t make it into the article either! The Times was woefully selective and used a sample best designed to give them the headlines the newspaper wanted. It’s not often that focus groups make it to newspapers so there is understandably a lot of interest. The Sun and the Sunday Times commission and publish YouGov polls on a very regular basis and almost all of them show consistent Labour leads. Given their political inclination and the relationship between News Corp and Ed Miliband it is not a surprise that they sought to construct a new angle to attack the Labour leader. However in using the approach they did to write up the focus group they diminished their credibility as a serious newspaper – and I don’t think they did YouGov any favours either.

My first reaction when I read The Times article was that it was a ‘hatchet job’. I’m glad that YouGov’s transparency helped show how it was done. I’d also be interested to know how many focus groups The Times commissioned because there is a great risk of selection bias. A newspaper could commission 3 focus groups, draw from the one that supported its arguments the best and not release the other 2 with everyone else none the wiser.

You can read the full transcript for yourself here. Focus groups have a role in politics but when Conservative-supporting newspapers can’t be relied upon to report them accurately, it’s best to take them with a pinch of salt and focus on the polls instead.

Neil Foster is the head of Progressive Polling

Update: Sam Coates – who wrote the original piece for The Times – has written a response to this piece in the comments below, which you can see here.