Tories criticized for sharing misleading information on social media five times more often than Labor

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The Conservative Party is almost five times more likely to be censored on social media for sharing false or misleading information online than the Labor Party, new study finds .

The government's main accounts, including those of the Prime Minister, ministers and the Conservatives' official Twitter/X feed, generated almost five times more community comments than those of the opposition, said a campaign group.

A fact-checking feature was made available on Twitter/X in the UK in January last year and allows users to add context or clarifications below posts containing false or misleading information. Contributors can leave ratings on any post and if enough contributors from different viewpoints find that rating helpful, the rating will be displayed publicly.

In total, 73 posts from government party accounts were accompanied by community notes, compared to 15 posts from government party accounts. official opposition

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Research commissioned by pro-EU campaign group Best for Britain examined the number of community ratings accumulated by all members of the cabinet and shadow cabinet, as well as their accounts party officials, on Twitter/X.

In total, 73 messages from government party accounts were accompanied by community notes, compared to 15 for official opposition accounts.

The worst offender was the official Conservative Party account which was flagged 26 times for posts including allegedly manipulated videos, false statements about the opposition leader and misleading statements about the economy.

An article that said the economy was “exceeding expectations” was accompanied by a community note that said “UK GDP fell last quarter, compared to an estimate of zero percent , so it does not exceed any expectations. »

Another article claimed that Sir Keir Starmer “called for the monarchy to be abolished” in 2021, but the community note pointed out that Sir Keir had said in 2005 that he “had used to propose the abolition of the monarchy."

The second minister himself was close behind, who – although he promised "integrity, professionalism and accountability to all levels” – was viewed by social media users 25 times in just over a year.

Rishi Sunak’s posts have been reported nine times since the start of 2024 and five in during the first week of January alone, where he claimed that...