The Campaign Company specialises in social research and behaviour change. This is your guide to what we’ve been reading. Here’s what’s coming up this week:
Hello and welcome to the TCC Weekly – the Friday bulletin for people who know their 1922 Committee from the 1941 Committee.
This week saw Labour Leader Keir Starmer take a gamble, by pledging to stand down if found guilty in the so-called ‘beergate’ story. We ponder, in our Values Lab, how voters in the three tribes will see Starmer’s roll of the dice.
And of course, there’s the veritable Vegas of memes and miscellaneous that is Charlie’s attic. This week’s includes polling on whether people prefer aisle or window seats (including the frankly weird minority who prefer the middle seat).
The Values Lab is based on the Values Modes segmentation tool – created by Cultural Dynamics and used by TCC– which divides the population into ethics-driven Pioneers, aspirational Prospectors, and threat-wary Settlers. Take the test here to see which you are.
This week saw Keir Starmer surprise critics, with an unexpected promise to stand down if found guilty of breaking lockdown rules in the so-called ‘beergate’ news story. Was this a principled stance or an unnecessary risk? The answer depends, in part, on your values, as the two heat maps below indicate.
The first map, on the left, shows agreement with the idea that ‘bending the rules’ is okay. Those who agree with this statement might, one could infer, be the most sympathetic towards Boris Johnson‘s efforts to wriggle off the hook for his own, far greater, misdeeds. And they would tend to be the least impressed by Starmer’s display of integrity this week.
The second map, however, shows agreement with the statement ‘I am a gambler at heart’. Those who agree with this would perhaps be impressed by Starmer’s willingness to roll the dice, wagering his career on factors beyond his immediate control. Boris Johnson, by contrast, could be seen as evasive and cautious in his efforts to squeak free – the opposite of a gambler..
What is interesting here is that the two maps are remarkably similar, with the strongest agreement with both sentiments occurring in the top left corner, among socially conservative Prospectors. This values tribe tend to be sympathetic to Tory messaging – especially the gung-ho approaches of Boris Johnson – and is a group among whom Labour needs to make headway. They are likely to be fairly common in Red Wall constituencies, for example.
‘Beergate’ does not seem to have changed perceptions of Starmer too much so far. The key question, based on the above, will be whether these segments regard the Labour Leader’s statement this week as a duly obedient piece of virtue signalling, or as a bold willingness to stick his neck on the line. The more it is cast as the latter, the more successful it will be.
And finally this week, the TCC wildcard that is Charlie’s Attic:
Avoid ‘nul points’ and get the lowdown on all the wild, whacky and often woeful acts that will be taking part in tomorrow’s Eurovision bonanza courtesy of Popbitch’s entertaining guide to all of the acts. Ciao!
