Exaggerated media claims of immigration threat may destroy poll integrities

Recent polls and surveys published in the UK media are claimed to have been grossly exaggerated, causing many to lose trust in survey results.

Conflicting stories in today’s online and offline media respectively claim that 350,000 Bulgarians and Romanians or 25 per cent of Bulgarians are poised to flood into the UK to grab jobs and benefits. Although both reports will spark yet more fears of unchecked immigration, doubts are emerging about the reliability of today’s and the many earlier surveys.

Constructive journalism, it seems, may be at fault here, with figures slanted by taking the most alarming and placing them at the head of the article. For example, the BBC’s latest poll claims that millions of Bulgarians and Romanians are looking to migrate, but the article leads with the fact that there’s no indication of a mass exodus heading for the UK.

The latest Telegraph rendering calculates its totals from the number who said they would ‘like’ to work in the UK but, further on in the article, states that most would only come if they had a job waiting. For readers of the UK media, equating a wish with a strong intention and publishing it as a fact may be seen as careless or even misleading.

The Sun’s estimate that almost 50 per cent of Britons are desperate to emigrate may strike a genuinely-felt chord in its readers’ hearts, but the facts state that only 352,000 actually left the country in the 12 months ending in June 2012. Polls and surveys are a useful way to calculate demographics and other conditions, but their use in today’s media may cause a lack of trust in their results.