Prior to the 2010 general election only three minority ethnic women had been elected to Parliament in Britain, all from the Labour Party. In 2010 the number rose significantly as a further eight joined their ranks on both the Labour and Conservative benches. Political candidates rely on news media to communicate with potential voters; but research from the U.K. and elsewhere has consistently shown that female and minority ethnic candidates receive less favourable coverage than their white, male counterparts. This paper compares both the frequency and tone of national newspaper coverage of female minority ethnic parliamentary candidates to that received by other racial/gendered groups in the run up to the 2010 election. Did the ‘novelty’ status of ethnic minority women alleviate the impact of the race/gender gap in terms of candidate visibility? Or did the double bind result in a double disadvantage, making minority women even less visible than white female and minority male candidates? This paper assesses whether the tone of coverage was more or less positive for ethnic minority women compared to other groups, and whether this varied between Labour and Conservative candidates, given the latter may have been seen as exceptionally anomalous. These questions have implications regarding the extent to which existing research findings about ‘race’ or ‘gender’ in work on electoral media coverage truly apply to minority women. While the excitement surrounding BME women as ‘firsts’ may counter some negative traits found in coverage of women and minorities, the combination of their race and gender may exacerbate others. I argue that there is much for political science scholars to gain by taking an intersectional approach to the study of women and minorities as political candidates and representatives.
