Were 88% of Conservative ads ‘misleading’?

First Draft News claimed 88% of Conservative ads were ‘misleading’, compared to 7% for Labour.

During the latest General Election campaign, political parties and campaigners often had their claims examined by independent fact-checkers.

An organisation called First Draft News claimed that for Conservative party advertisements on Facebook: “nearly 90% of the ads posted in the first days of December push figures already challenged by Full Fact”.

Their article initially claimed that no Labour ads had been similarly challenged. This summary was widely shared, including by the BBC, ITV, the Independent, and on social media. My article will examine this claim.

This image was shared by Richard Burgon MP, currently the Shadow Justice Secretary. (Image: Facebook)

First Draft News method

This is the process that First Draft News undertook to make their calculation:

1. Draw data from the Facebook Ads Library API on ads posted by the main accounts of major political parties, between 1st and 4th December 2019;
2. Look at the caption, image and link of each Facebook advert;
3. Check any claims made in these ads against those independent fact-checker Full Fact had already published;
4. Counting each duplicate and…