ITV Debate November 19

Executive Summary
A co-ordinated effort from activists helped the Labour party dominate online conversation during the
ITV leaders’ debate, Storyful analysis shows, as a number of prominent pro-Labour accounts called on
followers to create a “Twitter storm” to declare a #WinForCorbyn. The Conservatives, meanwhile, drew
flak online after its press office began masquerading as a fact-checking operation on Twitter.

A Storyful analysis of the three-hour period before, during and after the debate found users expressed
overwhelming negativity towards sitting Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn
fared better, but neither man could compete with Mauricio Pochettino, whose sacking by Tottenham
Hotspur garnered 30,000 more mentions across social media than the debate itself.

Labour, meanwhile, forked out for ads on Facebook and Instagram, running over 60 on the day of the
debate, versus just six for the Conservatives. Data for other platforms was not available.

Key Insights
01. Six of the 10 most shared links on Twitter during the period Storyful analysed were
from Jeremy Corbyn’s account. Most shared was a tweet sent immediately after the
debate alleging that the Conservatives would privatise the NHS. Only one of the 20 most
shared links was favourable to Johnson, and it came from the Conservative’s main account.

02. Lib Dems failed to crash the party: Attempts by the Liberal Democrats to use the hashtag
#DebateHer to highlight how leader Jo Swinson wasn’t on the stage didn’t go to plan,
drawing only 797 mentions from 7-10pm GMT.

03. Corbyn audience claim questioned: A screengrab of an unsourced message alleging that
Corbyn stayed to meet the audience while Johnson “legged it” was shared thousands of
times on Facebook. Some audience members disputed the claim, saying both men stayed a
short time. The original message was posted to Facebook by Labour supporter Jude
Rowley, who told Storyful that Corbyn stayed a “good deal longer” than Johnson.

04. Pochettino’s Spurs departure leaves debate in the shade: News that broke shortly
before the debate that Mauricio Pochettino had been fired as Tottenham Hotspur’s manager
threatened to overshadow the debate. Storyful analysis of the conversation about
Pochettino found 179,151 posts, 30,000 more than those that mentioned the debate.

Key

147.7k 91 179.2k
Metrics

Mainstream Mentions Fringe Mentions Pochettino Mentions

2
ITV Debate Timeframe

Key Conversation Metrics

3
ITV Debate

“Inappropriate and misleading”

Nine of the top ten tweets in relation to the Conservative Party's Press Office changing its name
to "factcheckUK" were critical of the move. By far the most engaged-with tweet came from
bona-fide fact checking organisation Full Fact.

It said: “It is inappropriate and misleading for the Conservative press office to rename their
twitter account ‘factcheckUK’ during this debate. Please do not mistake it for an independent
fact-checking service.”

In a statement, Twitter said: "Twitter is committed to facilitating healthy debate throughout the
UK general election. We have global rules in place that prohibit behavior that can mislead
people, including those with verified accounts. Any further attempts to mislead people by editing
verified profile information - in a manner seen during the UK Election Debate - will result in
decisive corrective action.”

It comes three weeks after Twitter said it will stop accepting political ads.

"We've made the decision to stop all political advertising on Twitter globally,” Jack Dorsey,
Twitter’s CEO, said in a tweet. “We believe political message reach should be earned, not
bought.”

"A political message earns reach when people decide to follow an account or retweet. Paying
for reach removes that decision, forcing highly optimized and targeted political messages on
people. We believe this decision should not be compromised by money," he added.

Sentiment Analysis of Reaction to the Name Change