Harry Potter is the most famous Brit

Harry Potter is the most famous Briton, narrowly beating James Bond and David Cameron, according to new research published today by the market research company Ipsos to coincide with the release of part one of The Deathly Hallows this Friday. A massive 96 per cent of people recognised the boy wizard when asked to identify him. The Prime Minister, David Cameron, is also a highly recognisable figure with only 6 per cent of people not knowing who he was. However, his fellow party leaders have a way to go before they are as well known as him. Nick Clegg was identified by three quarters (75 per cent) of respondents, which was less than Winston Churchill (89 per cent) and William Shakespeare (81 per cent). Ed Milliband was only recognised by 59 per cent, which was less than Alfred Hitchcock (64 per cent). Simon Atkinson, assistant chief executive at Ipsos, said:

“We all knew that Harry Potter was a cultural phenomenon, but to be more recognisable than the Prime Minister and Winston Churchill is quite an achievement. “It’s probably been a long time since so many people were unable to identify the leader of the Labour Party, particularly following 13 years of power. However, it’s still very early days for Ed Miliband and he’ll become a much better known figure in the next few years.”  

People were shown pictures of 9 famous Brits, both in fiction and real life, and asked to identify them:

• Harry Potter  96%
• James Bond 95%
• David Cameron  94%
• Winston Churchill 89%
• William Shakespeare 81%
• Nick Clegg 75%
• Alfred Hitchcock 64%
• Ed Miliband 59%
• Isambard Kingdom Brunel 26%

People want to send their children to Hogwarts… or their local comprehensive Every year thousands of parents face the dilemma of selecting a secondary school for their children. Competition for places at the best schools seems to get harder every year and families often choose their home based on the access to good education. However, if they had the choice of any school they wanted, almost a third (31 per cent) would send their children to Hogwarts, just edging out the local comprehensive at 30 per cent. These two were by far the top choices, with William McKinley High School from Glee only being the first choice for 3 per cent of people and just 1 per cent choosing Sunnydale high from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, possibly due to the high mortality rate of the students. Simon Atkinson said:

 “Hogwarts is a pretty dangerous place by all accounts and doesn’t seem to have much of a Maths or English syllabus, but it would still be the top choice for people to send their children at the age of 11. The idea of having a trained wizard in the family certainly seems to appeal. Either that or there are a lot of people that would like to pack their children off to school for months at a time to give them a little peace and quiet.”

People were asked if they could send their children to any of these schools, which would they choose:

• Hogwarts 31%
• Local Comprehensive 30%
• School of Rock 4%
• East High (High School Musical) 4%
• Rydell High (Grease) 3%
• St Trinian’s 3%
• William McKinley High School 3%
• Sky High (Superhero School) 2%
• Grange Hill 1%
• Waterloo Road 1%
• Sunnydale High (Buffy The Vampire Slayer) 1%
• None 16%

Notes for Editors The data was collected from 1020 respondents between the 5th and 8th November 2010 using Ipsos’s Online Omnibus. The sample was representative of GB population.