For six premiers, three women and three men, we wanted to see if there was a variation in the number of stories that were written about them and the kinds of policy that was forward in those stories, and then the tone. One of the things we found was that women had fewer stories published about them. For me, the most striking thing was that in the first year of her premiership in 2015, Rachel Notley in Alberta received fewer stories per day than Jim Prentice did in the nine months he was premier prior to the 2015 election. We have some evidence to suggest that women as heads of government don't get as much coverage as men do. Encouragingly, we find that the policy areas they receive coverage on are not overly feminized. They are on the issues their governments prioritize.
We have some evidence to suggest that when the media do talk about women's appearance, they are quite condemning. The tone is really negative. That's only in about 3% of coverage. We also found that men's appearance was discussed in about 3% of stories as well, but that was neutral.
I think the news has come a long way in Canada. It's more things like social media and the Internet that become a problem.