Slough MP Tan Dhesi receives dozens of toxic tweets, study finds

Over three million tweets mentioning MPs have been evaluated over a six-week period to find out just how much of that could be classed as toxic or severely toxic.

Findings have shown that more than 130,000 tweets mentioning MPs were considered likely to be toxic and 20,000 severely toxic.

The data, curated by the BBC has ranked the UK's MPs in order of how much online toxic-rated content they receive.

Slough's MP Tan Dhesi of the Labour Party was ranked 422 out of 602, with 1.3 per cent of tweets mentioning Dhesi being 'toxic'.

During the studies six week period Dhesi received 3641 tweets, of which 46 were toxic-rated.

In contrast, Maidenhead MP Theresa May received 7051 tweets during the same period, with 108 being deemed toxic-rated.

This correlated to May receiving a toxic-rated tweet 1.5 per cent of the time.

While Windsor MP Adam Afriyie also of the Conservative party receives toxic-rated tweets 1.4 per cent of the time - four out of the 289 tweets received during the study were considered toxic-rated.

The study shows that "stupid" and "pathetic" were the two most commonly used adjectives in toxic-rated tweets.  

Results found female MPs were more likely to be called "thick" and "ignorant" and be subject to sexualised language while their male counterparts were more likely to be called "liars".

All 20 of the MPs to receive the most abuse proportionally were not members of the cabinet or shadow cabinet.

The MP receiving the most toxic-rated tweets is Ben Bradley, the MP of Mansfield representing the Conservative party, who receives toxic-rated tweets 13.5 per cent of the time.

Current Prime Minister Rishi Sunak receives toxic-rated tweets 4.7 per cent of the time.

Findings suggest Conservative MPs were nearly twice as likely as Labour MPs to receive a tweet classed as severely toxic.

The study defined toxic-rated tweets as “rude, disrespectful or unreasonable comment that is likely to make someone leave a conversation”.