There are eleven times more 'liberals' at the BBC than 'conservatives'

One of the great things about Facebook is that you can find the nichest of niche groups of like-minded people. It has an advertising package to match. You can, for example, upload an ad banner that will appear 10,000 times to female twenty-somethings who live in York and enjoy listening to jazz. This kind of micro-targeting has got to be the next stage of the Party's online advertising campaign. The advertising package has other uses...

BBC employees went Facebook mad earlier this year with 10,580 now having profiles on the social networking site. Many of them chose to specify their political views as either liberal, moderate or conservative (there isn't a socialist option available to the chagrin of many). An advanced search reveals that more than 11 times the number of BBC employees on Facebook list themselves as liberal than conservative:

BBC - 10,580
BBC liberals - 1,340
BBC moderates - 340
BBC conservatives - 120

Former BBC journalist Robin Aitken, who has still yet to be properly interviewed by any of his many former colleagues about his whistle-blowing on its institutional biases, said you couldn't make a cricket team out of the number of Tories at the corporation. He wasn't far wrong!

To show that these proportions don't merely reflect the fact that the student-dominated Facebook is full of young liberal trendies anyway, a search of the UK-wide Facebook population reveals a liberal to conservative ratio of just 2.5 to 1, that's four times less liberal than those on the BBC network:

UK -  6,407,580
UK liberals - 545,240
UK moderates - 251,320              
UK conservatives - 216,660

Narrowing it down to the London network where most BBC employees reside, the ratio is still just nigh of 3 to 1 at 147,340 to 51,760.

Although 10,480 BBC employees is as big a sample as you're ever going to get in a survey, this isn't a definitive analysis. Facebook is more likely to attract younger employees and many of them wouldn't be comfortable publicly listing themselves as conservatives (they have their careers to think about!). It is, however, a pretty good guide to the political perspectives of those who work for our monolithic national broadcaster, and a worrying one at that.

p.s. We recently created a second Facebook group for ConservativeHome readers, when we reached a thousand members of the first one we lost the ability to mass-message them.

p.p.s. Hat-tip to Stephen Taylor's must-read blog on the Conservative Party of Canada, for the inspiration for this story

12pm update: There are tonnes of stats out there waiting to be found, go to the Flyers Pro section of the Advertising section of Facebook to find out the proportion of conservatives in your university or city. Other observations from me...

• The Lib-Con ratio is fairly even throughout the demographics of BBC employees, with men having a very slightly better ratio than women and over thirties slightly better than twenty-somethings.
• It's difficult to find other organisations that have a large enough sample as most people don't choose to declare their political views on their profile, but another one is the UK Civil Service network which has 5.6 liberals to each conservative.
• You can search for any keyword that is in the sections of people's profiles that describe what they are interested in, Open Europe's Neil O'Brien for example got a search result that said "there are less than 20 people in UK who like euro"

Deputy Editor

Comments

[CJ]

Off topic but thank you Alan for the link. I'm crying with laughter (it doesn't take much)

(Sending again as laptop crashed first time round)

[Matt Wright]

While this will tend to suggest BBC staff see themelves to the left, the terms are very confusing and the options limited. Are they meant to be political terms? I'm not sure I would in this context merely describe myself as conservative. On some issues I want to preserve the status quo and others I want change. The political term Conservatism encompases many issues.

Matt

[i_want_to_believe]

I don't understand why Conservatives do not have a policy for dismantling the BBC. It is an anti-conservative force that shapes the views of millions, yet it is owned by the State and funded by a compulsory fee. This is indefensible. The BBC cannot be reformed. It should be broken into little pieces and each one sold to the highest bidder.

[Chris Baldwin]

If you think this proves anything, congratulations, you're an idiot!

[David Gold]

Many of my Conservative voting friends list themselves on Facebook as 'liberal' or 'moderate'. They would be horrified if that was taken to mean they were in any way supportive of the Labour Party or the Liberal Democrats. Furtehrmore, there are many BBC employees who seem to have other priorities than joining Facebook or listing themselves as BBC employees. This is silly debating chamber politics and has no real gravitas. It is not a reliable test of political opinion.
Conservative Home has always tried to raise the bar of political debate and discussion. Please don't let's get obsessed with such nonsense.

[Praguetory]

"Re: the BBC bias - I would probably go along with Andrew Marr's defnition of a culturally liberal bias. Politically, they're a pretty apathetic bunch. I don't know anyone here who is particularly politically driven. The only thing that would get them fired up would be if you doubled the price of organic falafel."

From a friend who has worked at the Beeb for a decade.

[Tim Roll-Pickering]

As several have aluded to, the Facebook options are notoriously US based, to the frustration of many. There are numerous groups petitioning for political views to be open optioned, with numerous essays explaining that "liberal" has a different meaning for many. (And let's not even get onto whether or not people go to "university" or "college"/"grad school".)

Even if the BBC had a perfectly proportioned ratio of employees on Facebook I would still expect the "conservative" option to be proportionally low, because BBC employees are more likely than average to be aware of the US centric nature of the options and decline an option associated which for many doesn't mean "UK centre right" but "Bush supporting nutters".

[John Moss]

I was asked a question at a selection meeting about how I would explain to somebody on the doorstep why they should vote for me. I said,

"Madam, I'm not surprised you're confused. Labour act like authoritarian conservatives, the Lib-Dems are the New Left, Respect are the Old Left and the Greens are - well, just Left. Personally, I'm a liberal.

"The fact is none of the other parties will ever trust you. They'll stand up and say, "this is what you're concerned about and we're concerned about it to, so trust us to sort it out for you". The difference is that we will tell you what we want to do to sort out those problems and trust you to decide whether you agree with us or not.

"That's the difference. We trust you, they want you to trust them".

If that makes me a liberal, then so be it. I did however tag myself as conservative on Facebook!

[steve]

Does the Conservative Party have a network? How many of them are down as "Conservatives"?

I think this is pretty poor evidence to be honest. People can operate in a personal and professional capacity, and I'm sure people aren't recruited on the basis of their political leanings. Ask most young people in London what they are and very few will opt for "Conservative", whether they are Tories or not. On the other hand, most people want to be seen as liberal in attitude, myself included.

[Dan]

"It's not fair, it's not fair!" Pathetic - grow up all of you.

[Conservative Homer]

I really couldnt care less if the BBC is biased, we all know it is. Every other form of media is, and the better for it, papers, talk radio etc. In fact id like it if we had choices over conservative or liberal television news sources.

What bothers me is the unethical, outdated and utterly unaccountable way the BBC is funded, and the way it is allowed to masquerade as some sort of definitive news source.

[Citizen Grim]

If I worked at the BBC, and wanted to keep my job, I would not make it known that I was conservative.

So perhaps that throws off the stats a little bit? One hopes.

[Matt Wright]

Since this thread I've been looking more at Facebook and while I know its fashionable at the moment it sometimes is really quite sad and facile.

[John]

Most British conservatives are more liberal than American "liberals." Stop wetting your pants over an apples-to-oranges comparison.

[Phill Hallam-Baker]

The whole enterprise is misguided. Complaints of press bias are not new. In 1992 Murdoch's Sun proclaimed 'Its the Sun wot won it'.

And he was probably right. The Tories should have lost the 1992 election. It would have been better for everyone, especially the Tory party.

During the Murdoch years the Tory party grew complacent. MPs knew that Rupert's thumb was firmly on the balance and would tip them in their favor. Instead of purging shits who lied, cheated and then brought libel cases to silence their critics the Tory party circled the waggons round them.

Then one morning everyone woke up and discovered that Rupert Murdoch, friend of Chinese Communists was now BFF with Tony Blair. And as a direct result the Tory party has now been out of power for a decade and Labour look pretty much like a less sleasy version of the Major administration.

Its not a coincidence that the Web appeared when it did. It was a reaction. I didn't really see why an Australian who financed Mel Gibson's anti-British movies should be deciding who governs Britain.

Doesn't matter who the press is biased in favour of, it hurts them in the end. Eventually people start believing their own propaganda.

In 1992 I was working on the Web and with the Clinton-Gore '92 online campaign. I told them about the Web, Jock Gill and David Lytel developed the strategy of disintermediating the press.

Stop whining, get smart. Use the Web for what we built it for.

[Traditional Tory]

What a surprise, and I assume we can take it that 'liberal' = raving lefty.

I would have thought the ratio was more like 110/1.

[Comstock]

"I assume we can take it that 'liberal' = raving lefty."

No, we can't TT. For reasons both me and 'Changetowin' outlined above (26/10 @ 14.44)

[Martin Sewell]

Whilst I agree that the term "liberal" currently means something different across the Atlantic I fear that Conservatives do themselves little good by adopting it for themselves over here. In US terms liberals are a very worrying species, and I would commend to anybody the writings of Ann Coulter who is hilarious in her baiting of the US version. What is noticable however is that the BBC would never allow someone of such effective anti liberal opinion to be heard in the UK.
From Michael Moore to Al Gore, their's is a near adulation of the Amererican liberal tradition and if that continues to proceed unchallenged in our premier news media then Conservatives trying to nuance themselves as something different will be doomed to failure. Better by far to dump that association and start tarnishing their brand for a change. If you want to see how it can be done with wit venom and accuracy google Ms Coulter today!

[Robert Lucien Howe]

Its fortunate that there’s no Labour party or Liberal party to speak of otherwise we real liberals might become some kind of threat. At the moment I'm considering voting conservative. - Labour are far to right wing now and the liberals are to anti-nuclear. (To me anti-nuclear equals anti-environmental).
The most tempting of the small parties is probably UKIP, to me the EU is just to big to work as a democracy.

[Carl Eve]

Ever wonder if it was because Conservatives don't like going into the media, particularly the BBC, and instead want to become, say, accountants, bank managers, MPs, lawyers, solicitors, "something in the City Square Mile" or bloggers...

Just a thought y'know. I mean, I wonder how many left wing or liberal folk there are in Social Services, by comparison to Conservatives. Perhaps you should do some research with the University of Stating the Bleeding Obvious...

[Rupa Huq]

Hi. Have done a post on this myself http://rupahuq.wordpress.com/2007/11/02/bbc-entryism/
According to last week's Aerial the most common designation for BBC staffers is in fact "apathetic"

[mesmo]

I suppose everyone would be much happier if we let Rupert Murdoch run our national media and then the bias would be up for sale to the highest bidder?

Look at the current news blackout in Tibet or the recent blackout in Burma and say, hand on heart, that you're happy with the situation.

This isn't woolly liberal thinking when people are being killed by their own government and the troops meant to protect them... Think the Countryside Coalition march being attacked by riot police using live ammo and steel batons.

The BBC may be imperfect but there are times I thank god for it's willingness to talk when others stay quiet for the sake of their 'sponsors'.

Be careful what you wish for... Lest it become true.

[Tim Dennell]

Your blog entry states that on Facebook “there isn't a socialist option available, to the chagrin of many (BBC staff)”.

That’s factually untrue, there is NO pick-list of options for politics (or religion) at all on Facebook; the member has to enter words to describe themselves, or they can leave it blank. (I am a FB member.)

If you wish to criticise someone’s reporting then its essential that you are accurate yourself.

If the accusation is that 1,340 BBC staff described themselves as ‘liberals’ on Facebook - (340 as moderates and 120 as conservatives; presumably the remaining 8,780 could easily ‘don’t knows’ or ‘undecided’.) then D. Cameron could as easily describe himself as either ‘Liberal’ or ‘Conservative’ were he to be a member; he’s described himelsf in the past as a “liberal Conservative”. Liberal has a very wide meaning nowadays, not just a party political one. In US terms I’m a fiscal conservative and a social liberal for example.

[John Smith]

Tim Dennell: Your statement is currently accurate, but misleading, possibly not through your fault: It is true that now 'political views' is a write in box, however that is a recent change: when I joined about 15 months ago, around the time many of said BBC employees would have been, the 'Political views' was a drop-down which gave the choices of "Very liberal", "liberal", "moderate", "conservative" or "Very conservative". When this was changed to a write-in box, the field remained the same, and you had to manually change it after finding out that the change was possible, which wasn't advertised.

Given the US nature of the site, and the Statist attitudes in much of the media, it is highly unlikely that 'liberal' actually meant 'open minded believers in freedom', as in American terms it's actually another word for 'socialist'.