Commentary on quant data collection
Between August and December 2014, quantitative data was collected on the following for the period 1994-2014:
•	Public opinion on policy issue salience (source: Ipsos MORI);
•	Media coverage of policy issues in selected outlets (source: Lexis Nexis);
•	House of Commons debates on policy issues (source: parliament.uk via google).

Data collection related to guiding research questions as to:
1.	Salience of policy issues over time in each source, over time;
2.	The proportional significance of discourse on targets within these (media and HC debate only).
Public opinion data
Data presented on Ipsos MORI poll data:
Q: What would you say is the most important issue facing Britain today?
Q: What do you see as other important issues facing Britain today?
(Unprompted - combined answers)
Media reporting on policy issues
Data was presented on reporting of immigration, defence and environment by the Daily Mail, Telegraph and Guardian. This was obtained from Lexis Nexis and tabulated for each month from 1994-2014.
Search keywords were:
•	Immigration: immigration, asylum, migrant
•	Defence: defence procurement, defence acquisition, defence equipment, defence industry
•	Environment: climate change, global warming, C02 emission, greenhouse gasses.
It was decided that BBC News Online will no longer be searched for articles indicative of media salience. Its content isn’t representative of BBC TV coverage, as it includes a far broader editorial range, and variety of sources – e.g. comment, discussion, regional news. Also, results from BBC and Google searches which use the same search terms produce inconsistent results. E.g. Jan 1998 immigration from Google =2; BBC = 29. Using BBC alone to perform separate single keyword searches (no Boolean search facility available) would produce duplicate hits which include more than one of the keywords, skewing results.

Discussion of media reporting on defence

It was decided that the initial search of reportage on defence was too specific and should be done again using more generic keywords.
Defence search version 2:
More general keywords were used to search for news coverage of defence. The following search string was used:
“UK Defence” OR policy AND defence
This facilitates identification of articles which are about defence policy without requiring the two words to be contiguous.
Below, the results of search version 2 are plotted both separately and alongside the original search and Ipsos MORI data on public opinion:

Notes on defence search v.2
Volume of results

Total articles obtained by defence search 1:		10,082
Total articles obtained by defence search 2: 		31,452
Total articles obtained by immigration search:	62,520
Total articles obtained on environment search:	33,846

Defence search 2 clearly produces a significantly greater volume of hits than did the first search. The first search was more constrained to ‘procurement’ type articles than was the broader second search. However, the first search proved to primarily produce articles about the “defence industry” rather than the other keywords.

It should be noted that defence search 2 effectively only used two search clauses, as compared to the three used for immigration and four for environment.

Validity of results

Regarding the content of articles obtained by search 2, a lot of procurement-related hits may be missed by this broader search. This would then carry over to diminish relevance of subsequent searches of this population of articles to determine the relevance of targets/indicators, etc. However, the articles obtained by search 2 do include some which look highly relevant to procurement (ignoring stories like that of the migrant who arrived in the UK by hiding in a missile shipment).

For example:
1994 (search 2): 123 out of 1,294 include the terms defence procurement / acquisition / equipment / industry 

1994 (search 1): 421 hits for these terms.

Repeating these two-tier searches for 2004, but excluding “defence industry”:
	Search 1: 87 articles
	Search 2: 30 articles

It appears that many procurement related articles are missed by the otherwise seemingly broader second search.

Are periods of peak coverage replicated across search 1, search 2 and Ipsos MORI?

Some, but not many of the peaks in media coverage on procurement type issues (in search 1) are also demonstrated in the broader coverage of defence indicated by the broader, second search. E.g.:
Peak, Sep-Nov 2012 replicated.
Peak, Feb-Mar 2010 not replicated.

Peaks in public opinion rarely correspond to the volume of media reportage (as indicated by searches 1 and 2).

Notes on the keywords used for search 2

Defence AND Policy may be too broad a search term. It produces a large number of very general, likely spurious hits on the topic of ‘policy’ where language of defending something has been used. For example, a football manager’s defence ‘policy,’ defending woodland, and a lot of non-UK relevant articles. I.e. not about UK ‘defence policy’. 

When “defence policy” was tested (by itself) as a search term, it still produced a significant volume of hits (1,562 for 1994-2014). Using this alternative search term would, however, still significantly reduce the volume of total articles obtained:
UK Defence OR policy AND defence: 	2004 = 1688
UK Defence OR defence policy:		2004 = 118. 

'UK Defence' appears to be a suitable keyword. It obtained 684 hits for 1994-2014. 
These included pertinent hits, e.g.:
UK defence industry/programmes/spending/export/budget/secretary…
Also, “UK’s defences”.

Ministry of Defence was considered at the last meeting as a potential keyword. However, it would neither produce more nor new results beyond those obtained using the existing search 2 keywords. Perhaps articles about the MoD also tend to mention defence policy or UK Defence.

Searching news articles a second time - for indicators and ‘target(s)’
It was decided that this will comprise three searches: the first search using indicators of articles relating to the policy area; the second and third, subsequently, restricting this initial population of articles according to further contextual indicators and ‘target(s)’.
However, the order in which the initial population of media articles is subsequently searched in Lexis Nexis has a significant impact on the number of articles which are identified as of potential interest. For example, firstly searching within the initial population of news articles on immigration using ‘processing’ or ‘backlog’ as indicators of interest is more restrictive than would be searching the initial population using ‘target’ as an indicator.
I.e. there are two potential sequences to choose from: 
1.  General	2. “Target(s)”		3. Context
OR 	1. General	2. Context		3. “Target(s)”

To illustrate the different outcomes which result from this choice, see the figures below, produced by a pilot run for immigration articles, 2003-2005:
Pilot: 01/01/2003 – 31/12/2005:
Total articles mentioning immigration OR asylum OR migrant: 11,150
Method 1 (start by adding ‘target’ to initial keywords, then interrogate context)
Level 1 search AND target:		1022
Of which, backlog:		45
Of which, processing:		48
Backlog + processing:		93
Method 2 (start with variable context, then interrogate significance of ‘targets’)
Level 1 search AND backlog:		177
Of  which, target:		45
Level 1 search AND processing:	273
Of which, target:		48
Combined backlog + processing	450
Of which, target (combined):	93

Notes on the pilot run
Either way, the same articles which mention both targets and the contextual indicators (backlog /  processing) will be obtained.
However, restricting search results firstly by ‘target’ as a keyword provides more than twice as many results as would first restricting by contextual keywords.
The difference equates to significant divergence in the proportion of total articles which may be considered ‘of interest’: 9% for method 1; 4% for method 2. 
When searching the population of immigration related articles outside of 2003-2005, there are often none which mention both targets AND processing OR backlog. In contrast, more simply mention targets.
The semantics of ‘target’ as a keyword will produce false positives. For instance, what migrants target, or target as connoting a general object of interest or action (being targeted). However, many results which are pertinent to governmental targets seem to be omitted if the population of news articles is previously restricted according to contextual indicators such as ‘processing’ and ‘backlog’ before then searching this sub-set for articles which also mention targets.

Targets as a subset of media coverage
Overviews are also presented for the data collection on media coverage of immigration and environment, 1994-2014, including references to ‘target’ therein. Line charts are included to provide an overview of this data.
Comparing the previous data collated on policy saliency in press reporting (by keyword) to a subset of those articles which also mention ‘target*’.
Searches conducted for each month via Lexis Nexis, which provided the total number of articles using keywords for each of the three selected newspapers (Daily Mail & MOS; Telegraph; Guardian).
Search strings:
•	Immigration:  target + (asylum OR migrant OR immigration)
•	Environment: target + (climate change OR global warming OR CO2 emission OR greenhouse gas)
Consideration should be given to the presence of spurious hits resulting from the semantics of ‘target’. E.g. what migrants target; target as connoting a general object of interest or action (targeting something or being targeted) rather than the application of a substantive target.
There is also an issue of discussion of other ‘targets’ appearing alongside discussion of the policy areas of interest. For example, targets for reduced use of coal in electricity production alongside immigration in a discussion of general economic decline.
It should be noted that Lexis Nexis appears to change (expand) the content of its database of print news over time. On starting the current round of data collection, initial results were checked against previous data collection, finding that the current number of articles on immigration in the Guardian had doubled for 2014 and otherwise generally increased since 2005 compared to what was previously indexed in September. This increase only appeared for the Guardian and has now been updated in the current data set so as to allow for comparison with the newly collated data on articles referring to target*. Such changes by Lexis Nexis mean that it would be very time consuming to keep changing our search terms with the intention of comparing sub-sets of reportage against the current data set which I’ve collated – as it may require the base-line data-set to be redone to allow comparison with any new sub-sets of data to be compiled (otherwise the new data would be grounded in a different baseline total population than the previously compiled data which its supposed to be a sub-set of).

Charts for Environment

Charts for Immigration

Notes on House of Commons Searches	
Also included is an overview of data collection on House of Commons debates on immigration and environment, 1994-2014. Data on general coverage of these policy issues is provided, along with line charts. I elaborate on concerns about the scope for collecting valid data on references to ‘target’ within these HC debates.
First dataset: general salience of policy issues in HC debates
Overview: causes for concern about validity
The parliament website doesn’t have its own advanced search facility. As such, careful use was made of an advanced google search (detailed below). However, serious reservations must be noted about the reliability of its results. Where there were more than 50 and especially where approaching 100 or more hits, google often repeatedly revises the total number of results when one scrolls through the pages of hits. Very occasionally google would not settle on a stable total, resulting in a possible margin of error of up to 200% for certain months.  For these instances, searches were repeated and, where necessary, consistency with the range provided by surrounding months was checked in order to determine which number to trust. These issues relate more to searches for immigration debates – due to their greater number - than for environment. Unfortunately, this dubious reliability may be unavoidable, as google is not designed for the purposes to which it was put to use (accurately totalling hits under very specific search requirements, rather than estimating general hits to help someone find a website of interest).
Within this possible margin of error, the dataset should adequately serve to provide a general impression of the rise and fall in political attention to the two policy areas in the Commons over time. 
General notes
•	Where months included a recess of parliament, total hits are lower (esp. August & Sept).
•	Elections could have an impact in either direction on the total (inc. recesses before elections).
o	E.g. No debates on immigration in April 1997.
o	Very few debates in April – May 2010.
Observations
Immigration: very erratic, but with some definite peak months.
Climate change: much more consistent; evident importance of Kyoto; possible peaks of interest. 

Second dataset: references to target within debates on imm / CC 
It does not appear possible to produce a valid longitudinal dataset enumerating debates which address the use of targeting in a particular policy area (as defined by keywords). This is due to the preponderance of spurious results produced by each of the various search methods trialled. Manual exclusion of spurious results obtained using online searches would be prohibitively time consuming if applied to the full 20 year target period (as it would involve manually checking many thousands of results). 
Summarised below are the search procedures trialled, including comments on concerns raised about the results produced.
Overview of search strategies
Parliament.uk does not have an advanced search function. As such, three possible search methods were trialled: advanced google searches of parliament.uk; advanced google searches of Millbank Systems’ Hansard archive; and Millbank systems’ own search engine. Advanced google searches of parliament.uk appear more amenable for large scale data collection as the search protocol was less prone to produce website errors, more wieldy (more feasible to execute 960 variations to produce the data set, where other methods were far more time consuming) and it also produced more results. Unfortunately, concerns should be considered about both the comprehensiveness and validity of the results obtained by each of the three search methods. I get into this below.
Example Search Strings Used
Commons debates in June 2004 which mentioned immigration and ‘target’. 
Results included written responses (which often seemed to make up a majority of relevant Commons business), Commons and Westminster Hall debates. Lords debates were excluded. Results did not include Committee proceedings and reports.
For each google search, ‘similar results’ were forcibly included (they are normally automatically excluded). Google’s headline estimates of the number of results were not reliable, so results were counted where necessary.
Parliament.uk (google advanced search)
inurl:cmhansrd intitle:2004 intitle:jun site:www.publications.parliament.uk target ( asylum OR migrant OR immigration )
Google’s built in function cannot reliably control presentation of results within a specified date range. As such, date restrictions were applied by means of the search string to the title of webpages (hits). Using e.g. Jun instead of June provides for vastly more hits, only excluding indexes of debates, etc. without excluding actual debates or written answers. Due to variation over time in the system of titling webpages, July can’t be abbreviated for certain years (2006-2014) but must be for others (1994-2005). September must be Sept 1994 – 2005, and Sep 2006-2014.
.millbanksystems.com
1.	SEARCH: target (asylum OR immigration OR migrant)
2.	Select year, month, order by date.
3.	Manually identify commons, written answers, Westminster hall debates (not Lords).
This search protocol is time consuming as results must be manually scanned for appropriateness due to duplicate hits and the inclusion of Lords debates.
Millbank (google advanced search)
target (immigration OR asylum OR immigrant) site:http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/2004/jun OR site:http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/written_answers/2004/jun OR site:http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/westminster_hall/2004/jun
This search string is time consuming to accumulate data, as the date must be changed 3 times for each month searched. Ultimately, it seemed prone to ‘break’ due to website errors.
Reliability of the data produced by search methods
Validity of results
Parliament.uk produces a significant number of spurious results. E.g. none of the ~5 hits for debates on targets and immigration in Feb 1994 were to do with targeting in immigration. This problem is caused by its presentation of a compilation of multiple, varied topics debated on the same day of Commons business in a single webpage – targets may appear in one topic of debate, whilst the policy of interest is the focus of another debate archived on the same webpage. 
Due to its separation of debates into one webpage per topic, Millbank’s hansard archive initially seemed like a preferable source for data collection – potentially avoiding some of the spurious hits described above for parliament.uk. However, Millbank’s hansard archive is also prone to spurious hits. None of the hits from the google search of Millbank for Feb 1994 were about targets in immigration. In so far as both keywords (target and policy indicators) appeared in the same debate, it is potentially more reliable than parliament.uk.
Googling Millbank may produce more accurate hits than parliament.uk. However, its dataset only runs to 2005. Divergent results for each search protocol trialled means that using Millbank for 1994-2004 and Parliament.uk for 2005-2014 would produce a non-comparable data-set. This is a particular issue due to the seeming tendency of parliament.uk to produce more (spurious) results  – which could lead to a false impression that there were more debates about targets in later years covered by parliament.uk but not Millbank. Googling Millbank’s archive also seemed prone to produce web errors.

Comprehensiveness
Beyond these concerns over validity, no single method of searching Commons debates produces a convincing appearance of being comprehensive. Each search method produced not only different numbers of results for comparable searches, but also produced different results, with only partial overlap across the outputs of the three search protocols.
Example: June 2004, target (immigration OR asylum OR migrant):
•	Millbank: 		10 hits
•	Googling Millbank: 	16 hits
o	Includes several hits Millbank’s own search function didn’t identify
o	Doesn’t include some hits produced by Millbank’s own search function.
•	Googling parliament.uk	29 hits
o	This significant increase is likely due to a large number of spurious hits. Yet, this search also missed relevant examples (e.g. written answer on targets in processing citizenship applications). 
•	Each of the searches missed certain results obtained by the other alternatives.
Provisional conclusions on searching commons debates
Concerns were raised that any appearance of an increase in the discussion of targets in parliamentary debate over time may either be spurious or indicate the general ascendancy of targets in political discourse, rather than anything particular about immigration or climate change. This is as it has not been possible to tie discussion of targets directly to debates about immigration or climate change due to the presentational format in which the parliament website collates Hansard records.
The only way to get a robust data set of debates for target months of interest for further investigation would be to triangulate using all three search methods trialled, collating outputs and excluding duplicates.  In collating the search hits, one could then also exclude spurious hits resulting from keyword semantics and from ‘target’ appearing in a different debate topic from that which included the policy keywords (within the same webpage). This would be very labour intensive, so would only be feasible for particular, short target periods of interest and not for extended periods. The result could, however, be of use in providing figures to contextualise subsequent qualitative analysis of debates on targeting. E.g.: 
•	Number of debates referring to the policy area (according to keyword indicators);
•	Number of these debates referring to target (at that particular time);
•	Hence, the proportional extent to which debates on the policy issue of interest were dominated by a discourse of targets at that time.
•	Depending on the complexity and volume of results to be manually screened, more than one keyword could be used as an indicator of target discourse.