ITV News at Ten will ramp up its General Election coverage this week by delivering, in collaboration with ComRes, an instant quantitative assessment of the Election Debates through a UK first in political polling.

Working with ComRes, ITV News at Ten will give viewers instant analysis of the impact that Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg have made on the electorate in the series of historic debates. Immediately after the three Election Debates on April 15th, 22nd and 29th ITV News at Ten will broadcast details of ComRes telephone polling of over 1,000 respondents on who they thought ‘won’ the debate, which party they plan to vote for, and then two questions on specific topics covered in each debate.

This is the first time that such instant telephone polling technology has been used to assess the impact of a live political event in the UK. To enable this, ComRes has recruited a panel of 15,000 people who are planning to watch each election debate and agree to be contacted following them to participate in a very fast-turnaround poll. The instant polling is conducted using a dedicated automated telephone system voiced by ITV News’s James Mates, who will present the findings on that night’s ITV News at Ten.  Within minutes of each debate, ComRes will interview a minimum of 1,000 respondents and deliver results directly into the ITV newsroom.

Deborah Turness, editor of ITV News, said:

“We have really pushed the boundaries of polling to give ITV News at Ten’s viewers an instant assessment of the true impact of the Election Debates. Rather than subjective discussion on which leader scored most points, through ComRes we will deliver the first scientific quantitative assessment of what the electorate really think. We believe that historic events such as the debates deserve unique analysis to show their impact.”

Andrew Hawkins, ComRes chairman, said:

“The leader debates are a major innovation so it is entirely appropriate that they are marked by a new way of measuring voters’ response. The immediacy of ITV News at Ten means that this analysis of reaction really can be brought to the public within minutes of the debates ending.  It’s a very exciting moment for any polling company.”

In addition, ComRes has also recruited a panel of 20 undecided voters in two key marginal constituencies in Bolton.  During the three live debates, ComRes will be conducting ‘worm polls’ – throughout the debates the panel in Bolton will be watching and recording their satisfaction with what the leaders are saying on a handset.  The scores are collated automatically and recorded in a time series of data forming a graph that will feature in further analysis of each debate on that night’s ITV News at Ten.

To see the published full results tables for these polls as they come out, visit our General Election 2010 page.