Session 2 - Digital Spin and the 2010 Election
What are the lessons of 2010 for political journalism and political communications?
The 2010 election saw the first prime ministerial debates, the growth of online campaigning and the real-time drama of the formation of the first coalition government since the Second World War. It was meant to be the first truly new media election but it ended with record audiences for television and arguments about the influence of newspapers and their proprietors.
How much has changed and how much remains the same? What strategies worked and which ones did not? And how far will British political communications – and political journalism – have to adjust to the prospect of a period of coalition politics?
Session Speaker
Simon Lewis is Honorary Professor of Public Relations at Cardiff University and one of the country’s leading corporate communications executives. He was the Queen’s first director of communications as well as director of Communications for Natwest and Vodafone.
In 2009 he was appointed Director of Communications at 10 Downing Street and Prime Minister’s Spokesman, a post he held till Gordon Brown’s resignation in May 2010.