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BBC David Dimbleby Brandwatch

Nigel Farage bombs on social media as Nationalist leaders pick up mostly positive reception during BBC debate

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By John Glenday, Reporter

April 17, 2015 | 2 min read

The dust may have settled on the BBC’s Challengers’ debate last night but the reverberations of the five-way tussle continue to resonate in the social media realm, with Nigel Farage harming his party's popularity by turning on the studio audience.

A post-debate analysis conducted by Brandwatch found that the two nationalist leaders were the big winners on the night with Plaid Cymru’s Leanne Wood emerging as the most positively received leader whilst the SNP’s Nicola Sturgeon garnered the most positive sentiment as the arguments unfolded.

On the opposite side of the coin two leaders notable only by their absence, David Cameron and Nick Clegg, predictably received the most negative sentiment for their no-show.

It wasn’t a great night for UKIP either which lost the most ground on social media over the course of the night as Farage compalined about the chosen audience which led to boos, before host David Dimbleby was cheered for explaining that they were chosen independently to represent a diverse group.

Farage said: "There just seems to be a total lack of comprehension on this panel, and indeed amongst this audience, which is a remarkable audience even by the Left-wing standards of the BBC."

As a result, Ukip's social media popularity dipped on the evening, Brandwatch figures claim.

In a statement Brandwatch observed: “Five minutes after the debate started things were like this: The two absent leaders were the least popular. Negative sentiment for Nigel Farage and Natalie Bennett fell sharply as the debate kicked off.

“Looking at the stats by party, The SNP garnered the most positive sentiment and UKIP lost the most ground during the debate with regards to positive sentiment going from 43 per cent positive to 28 per cent positive over 1.5 hours.”

BBC David Dimbleby Brandwatch

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