British Newspapers?

Could someone give me a quick rundown of the major British newspapers, i.e., quality, political slant, tone, etc?

Thanks.

British newspapers are broadly split into two categories, tabloids and broadsheets. Tabloids generally have more of a celebrity and lifestyle focus and less in-depth analysis of news stories than broadsheets.

This list is off the top of my head, and shouldn’t be considered exhaustive.

Broadsheets:
[ul][li]The Times : long-established, regarded as rather staid and prone to blustery right-wing conservatism.[/li][li]The Sunday Times : immense Sunday edition of the above. Infamous for the sheer number of supplemental sections and magazines it comes with. Has been known for the quality of its investigative reporting in the past, although I’m not sure what the current state is. Still a right-wing bias.[/li][li]The Financial Times : not related to the two papers above, but a daily financial news paper. Right of centre but harder to spot as it steers clear of social issues and commentary.[/li][li]The Independent (and The Independent on Sunday) : newer broadsheet that trumpets its neutrality. In reality, a clean, generally objective read that still wavers between slightly left-wing and slightly right-wing. IMHO, more to the right than the left.[/li][li]The Guardian : my personal choice, and famed traditionally for being left-of-centre (and having the worst editing of any broadsheet). These days it’s very liberal (anti-monarchy, pro-Euro), but we’re not talking socialist here.[/li][li]The Observer : Sunday edition by the same team as The Guardian. Probably less left-wing and more involved in investigative reporting and lifestyle stories [Sunday papers are generally more involved in investigative reporting than news reporting due to them being produced earlier than other daily papers].[/li][li]The Daily Telegraph (and The Sunday Telegraph) : close to the Times in political viewpoints, if not further to the right. Regarded as lest blustery and staid than the Times (just about) and with high-quality sports reporting.[/li][li]The Scotsman : not too sure, but my vague recollection is of a less stuffy version of the Times with a Scottish focus.[/ul][/li]
The tabloids:
[ul][li]The Sun : highest circulation of any daily paper. Mix of right-wing commentary (particularly on crime and Euroscepticism), celebrity gossip, kiss-and-tell stories and sport. News is usually brief and without in-depth analysis. Lots of breasts.[/li][li]The Daily Mirror (and The Sunday Mirror) : very close to The Sun in content, but is claiming to be taking a more serious approach at the moment. Will often take the opposite viewpoint to the above paper just to be contrary; has made motions in the direction of more serious reporting (e.g. John Pilger’s writing on September 11 was very unusual for a tabloid).[/li][li]The Daily Mail (and The Mail On Sunday) : tabloid in design, semi-broadsheet in content. Nasty, reactionary and right-wing IMHO; can be relied upon to make digs at anything ‘trendy’, ‘liberal’ or ‘PC’.[/li][li]The News Of The World : Sunday tabloid usually filled with lurid kiss-and-tell stories and some surprisingly addictive investigative stories (usually setting up minor celebrities in sting operations or uncovering corrupt police officers, landlords etc).[/li][li]The Daily Express : failing tabloid recently taken over by a porn baron. Cost-cutting has led to poor-quality reporting and plugs for his own media group. A bit of a joke in media circles.[/li][li]The Daily Star : think Sun-lite. Celebrities, lifestyle, a quick glance at genuine news.[/li][li]The Daily Record : Scottish tabloid, not too far from The Sun but with a clear Scottish focus.[/li][li]The People : (and The Sunday People) : no idea. I’m thinking News Of The World, but less popular and with less interesting scandals.[/ul][/li]> April 2002 daily newspaper circulation figures
> April 2002 Sunday newspaper circulation figures
> The Guardian’s press and publishing news section

Broadsheets
The Times - “establishment” newspaper, traditionally conservative
The Daily Telegraph - competes with the Times, traditionally conservative - there used to be some saying about “those seemingly in power read the Times, those actually in power read the Telegraph,” something like that
The Guardian - very left wing, favourite among media types (my English teacher used to describe Guardian readers as “bearded men with sandals”)
The Independent - also left wing

"Middle Markets"
The Express - suffered greatly from the Mail’s success, also suffered when it was bought out by some company that also owned porn titles IIRC
The Daily Mail - huge success story of the 90s, saw circulation saw as it tapped into a largely female and very much “middle England” mindset. Unashamedly conservative. Only paper that has never bothered with website AFAIK, they didn’t see the point as their niche audience traditionally weren’t early internet adopters

Tabloids
The Sun - UK’s most popular paper, all the tabs/“red tops” but especially the Sun have a strong relationship with TV, the Sun covers Big Brother like real news, as well as some soap storylines, very celebrity-driven, Sun was conservative until Blair ran for election - “The Sun Back’s Blair” was the election day headline - but it’s since been increasingly critical of the Labour party, also has an amazing website
The Mirror - poor version of the Sun, has struggled to niche itself, tried to go more middle market, editor implicated in some fairly dodgy insider trading or something
The Star - ultra thin, trashy version of the Sun, but all celebrity news
The Sport - tabloid paper form, but really a porn mag. IMO it should be sold on the top shelf. No news of note, all celeb/sex/topless. I’ve read stories in it where rape in a rape trial was described as “romp” and the attributes of the victim - eg “16-year-old schoolgirl” were played up - pretty sicko. It may have changed in recent years

You may be able to guage political leaning and quality by viewing some of the newspaper websites:

> The Electronic Telegraph (the first UK paper online, although may have gone partially pay-only)
> Guardian Unlimited (award-winning series of websites on a range of areas)
> The Observer (basically identical to the Guardian’s website)
> This Is London (I forgot The Evening Standard, a daily London-only newspaper)
> The Financial Times (largely pay-only)
> The Independent
> The Scotsman
> The Sunday Times (registration required, I think)
> The Times (registration required, I think)
> Daily and Sunday Express (the cheap tacky content-free website here gives you and indication of the paper’s quality)
> The Daily Mirror
> The Morning Star (I forgot this one too; the socialist daily newspaper)
> The Daily Star (WARNING: may be blocked by corporate firewalls due to the fairly salacious content)
> The Sun

The **Times ** is read by the people who run the country.

The Mail is read by their wives.

The Telegraph is read by people who remember how the country was run 50 years ago.

The Express is read by people who think the country is still run that way.

The Sun is read by people who don’t care who runs the country so long as they have big breasts.

The Lincolnshire Echo is read by about ten people in Lincolnshire, including my Dad.

The following is bound to crop up, as soon as anyone mentions British papers:

I found it at http://www.rckgm.org/bulletin/vol15/1527.htm .
Does anyone know where it originated? I would guess ‘not nine o’clock news’ or 'Yes minister ’ (Or whatever the show was called.) Does anyone know for sure?

It’s not a bad generalisation, although a bit dated.

I would agree with Crusoes assessments, except that my view is that the independent ends up being more leftish and liberal than the guardian, e.g. it is consistently antiwar, prodrugs reform, anti GM etc

I think we’ve got your political leanings by now then :rolleyes:

I don’t know the origin, but I’m fairly sure it pre-dates the two shows mentioned. Drat - now I am wondering where it came from!

:slight_smile:

According to this audio clip, the quote features in the Yes, Prime Minister episode ‘A Conflict Of Interest’ (December 1987):

Did it originate there, or was that ‘liberated’ from something else?

dont forget the Daily / Sunday Sport, even more right wing and unbelievable than the Sun. the sunday version carries this weeks nipple count (usually hovering around 50-60, sometimes a lot more) which gives you some idea of its quality, although it was better when it first appeared (early 90s i think) and featured outlandish world weekly news style stories- german bombers on the moon, elvis is living in some backwater english town, devil found to have hung himself-good triumphs- pictures inside etc, all featuring comments from made up academics.
the evening standard is poison reading
:smack:

Sorry I can’t be more spcific, [c]Crusoe** but I am sure I heard it in the late 1970’s, and it is probably older than that. I’ll try to check though.

The ‘paper x is read by people y’ joke list was used in Yes, Prime Minister as Crusoe says, and that may have been when it was first heard by millions of viewers. But it was not invented by the show’s writers. These days people circulate ‘funny’ stuff by email. Before that, it was by fax or telex or by people photocopying favourite funnies and handing them round. This list (and n variations) was going round office fax machines in the mid-to-late 1970s. I first saw it (in fax form) when someone brought it into school as an example of the stuff his Dad received on the factory fax machine.

I would bet that like many such items, it actually originated in the corridors of Whitehall. Politicians are pretty boring when talking about politics (IMHO), but informally and among themselves they come up with a great deal of funny stuff that they can never say ‘on the record’.

Re the OP, I’d say Crusoe’s fine list was pretty much on the money. He didn’t include the ‘Sunday Sport’ and its stable, but then again it’s hard to see how this qualifies as any kind of newspaper.

Crusoe, That was an excellent assessment of the state of British journalism.

what about the Evening Standard - evening London newspaper that’s pretty right wing and very anti left wing.

The current state of the Evening Standard is so far to the right that Mayor Livingstone was recently heard praising its comparatively moderate line under the Editorship of Max Hastings.

London must be the only city of comparable size that has only one newspaper of its own - a position the Standard maintains by handing out the free Metro to commuters each morning.

ChrisM should also realise that although most of the papers mentioned here are published in London they are sold nationally - of course there are also numerous local and regional papers too.

None of the tabloids are worth reading if you take current affairs seriously. They get all the facts jumbled up, espesially in scientific articles, and the reporting is often so biased that if you happen to be of a different opinion to the reporter you just want to pan their face in.

Another thing I have noticed in tabloids, which I find quite bizarre, is that if they print a picture of a convicted criminal, say a murder or rapist, they caption it with “Monster” or “Beast” or some other similar phrase. As if you needed telling…

Second the excellent summary by Crusoe and not too shabby coding !

No one has yet mentioned the name ‘Murdoch’, who can currently be found wheeling his numerous big guns in the general direction of the Euro. Top of my head he owns:

The Times
The Sunday Times
The Sun
The News Of The World…anymore ?

In fact, as far as I recall, the only papers not in the clutches of one international corporation or another are the Guardian and Observer – didn’t The Independent go west a while back ?

Yep - literally. It’s currently owned by the Irish-based Independent News & Media plc.