If it was a major victory for the Liberal Democrats to be granted equal rights in the rules of engagement in the TV leaders' debates (see
previous post), the same can surely be said of
Sky News being granted equal debate broadcasting rights with the
BBC and
ITV.
BARB statistics suggest that Sky News has an audience of about two million - but whether that includes all the people watching it in hotel rooms abroad isn't clear.
Unless something happens in the second debate on Sky News this Thursday to turn the third one on BBC into an exciting final knockout round, two advantages make it look as though ITV will be the winner in the ratings battle. They had the luck to draw the straw to make history by broadcasting the first ever televised debate in a UK general election. And, by scheduling it immediately after Coronation Street, they had a captive mass audience of soap opera fans ready and waiting as history was about to be made.
But the Sky News debate on Thursday will come on after - er - Sky News.
So as big a question as how the LibDems managed to get equal rights for their leader in the debates is how the Murdoch media group managed to elbow other worthy candidates like Channel 4 News into touch to put Sky News on an equal footing with the BBC and ITV?
ANSWER:
Since posting this and putting a link to it on Twitter, I'd like to thank Tom Rayner (@Tom_Rayner), Home Affairs Producer for Sky News, for tweeting the following helpful answer to my question "Sky News led the campaign for the leaders' debates - and were key players in the negotiations" http://bit.ly/1d51YU