Matt Freckelton Following on from our hugely successful infographic analysis of the Budget Day Speech, we have created another one for the recent State Opening of Parliament. The Yatterbox analysts have crunched the numbers and the designers have been up all night working on the infographic; so it is time to share our findings.
We tracked and collected just over 1,700 Tweets, a significant increase in our daily average, but not quite as many as the eye watering 2,707 we gathered on Budget Day. As was the case with Budget Day, Labour dominated the debate with roughly 45% of the conversation (the rest largely being made up by the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats).
In this occasion we have also identified high profile tweeters from specific political parties, and those who were most prolific on the day. Leading the charge for the Conservatives was Louise Mensch; statistically one of the most influential politicians on the web, scoring 67/100. In second and third place respectively, but by a significant margin of difference it should be added, were Labour’s Chris Bryant (scoring 59/100) and the Liberal Democrats’ Julian Huppert (scoring 58/100).
These scores and specific topics mentioned are important because they help us to understand how other users of social media in the wider community are affected by politicians’ views on the Queen’s Speech.
There were some rather interesting and unusual Tweets during the Speech. Certainly Huw Irranca Davies’ Tweet about Dennis Skinner sums up his annual jibe (she stated that “he is now as much a part of the queen’s speech ceremony as Black Rod”).
As expected, on the whole Tweets from the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats were of a positive nature, whilst those from the Labour Party were a mixed batch of one off comments and some serious questions, especially concerning Croatia’s entry into the European Union.
In the final section of our analysis we have tried to create an overview of the key talking points throughout the whole day; before, during and after the Speech. High on the agenda is “Lords Reform”, and whilst many pundits and commentators highlighted the lack of announcements relating to the Economy, it was a clear talking point for the day with “Jobs” and “Growth” both getting significant traffic.
All in all the State Opening of Parliament is a fascinating event; indeed from a British citizen’s perspective, it is one of the many traditions that we hold dear to our country. It is difficult to imagine what citizens from other countries make of the whole performance, bearing in the mind that a comparable event to the Queen’s Speech is the State of the Union Address by the President of the United States. Moreover, the quip that Dennis skinner gave (here) would not be welcomed in the United States, highlighted by an incident in which Republican Representative of South Carolina, Joe Wilson heckled President Obama in September 2009 (here). He later retracted his comment and apologised. I think it is unlikely that Dennis Skinner will follow suit!?
