Benefits stigma: how newspapers report on welfare by Randeep Ramesh.
From the post:
New research out today looks at the benefits stigma in Britain. The Guardian’s social affairs editor takes a look at the most common myths and sees how content on welfare differs by newspapers.
Those working in benefits and with claimants have become increasingly exasperated with the gap between the reality of poor peoples’ lives and the rhetoric of welfare reform.
Such is the scale of successive governments’ disinformation that the report by Turn2us, part of anti-poverty charity Elizabeth Finn, calls for ministers to abandon briefing journalists in advance of their speeches and asks departments to seek corrections for “for predictable and repeated media misinterpretations”.
It is articles like this one that have me contemplating a hard copy subscription to the Guardian.
Mapping the distortions won’t stop them but might sharpen your aim on their sources.