Sunday, November 16, 2014

Cameron's "it's all over" narrative falls apart as 60% of the Scottish electorate demand another independence referendum - and 48% want it within just TEN YEARS

Ignore the utterly desperate spin Davie Clegg of the Record is putting on the new Survation poll his paper commissioned - the results are nothing short of catastrophic for the narrative of "it's over, it was decisive, for heaven's sake let's all move on" that he and his spiritual overlord Mr Cameron (along with the rest of the London political and media establishment) have been trying to pedal for the last two months.

Total who want another independence referendum : 60%
Total who don't want another independence referendum : 28%

Total who want another independence referendum within ten years : 48%
Total who don't want another independence referendum within ten years : 40%

This is massive - it means that, at least as things stand in the current febrile atmosphere, there's clear support for another referendum well before "a generation" has passed.  And that's without even factoring in the possibility of a major change in circumstances, such as a betrayal of The Vow, or Scotland being forced to leave the EU against its will.

And yet if you allow yourself to be guided by Davie's headline in the Record, you'd be forgiven for believing that the really significant news here is that 28% of people don't want another referendum - because we all know that 28% is a much bigger number than 60%, don't we?  Davie also reads epic significance into the fact that 6% of respondents claim to have suffered a permanent falling out as a result of the referendum - even though this of course means that an utterly trifling 94% of respondents don't claim to have suffered a permanent falling out, even when they're asked a leading question.

The overwhelming appetite for a second referendum is very much in line with other polls since September, and this poll also concurs with the earlier evidence that support for Yes in any new vote would be higher.  However, the extent of the increase is not as great as in the YouGov and Panelbase polls, and still leaves No in a slight lead by 53% to 47%.  The important thing, though, is that we can be confident that the 2% boost for Yes is real, because Survation have introduced weighting by recalled referendum vote to make sure.  That means this may well be, in real terms, the highest Yes vote Survation have ever recorded - 47% is at the upper end of their previous "normal range", but that's before you take account of the likely adjustment caused by the new weighting.  Panelbase introduced a similar procedure in their recent poll, and that led to quite an extreme downweighting of the Yes vote - they had Yes in the lead by 51% to 49%, but that would have been significantly higher if the old methodology had been retained.

It's also important to note that Survation became known as being almost a "broken record" pollster during the campaign - apart from after a major methodological change, they never showed anything more than very minor shifts in opinion, even as other pollsters were reporting a massive swing to Yes.  It could be that Survation online panellists are unusually entrenched in their opinions, and therefore won't fully reflect any real world changes on the ground.

The other key finding of this poll is that Scotland would vote to stay in the EU in Cameron's proposed in/out referendum, and by a much wider margin than suggested by the Panelbase poll -

Stay in the EU : 47%
Leave the EU : 35%

That's another hammerblow for the Murdo Fraser/Kenny Farquharson worldview that insists Scottish public opinion is "more or less" identical to the rest of the UK.  With recent Britain-wide polls suggesting that the UK is on course to leave the EU, a major constitutional crisis in pro-European Scotland is now very much on the cards.

12 comments:

  1. Yet with the same data Clegg at the Record led with a quarter do not want an indy ref and did not add those that did together as they made up a clear majority. There will always be 25% of people in Scotland who want things to stay as they are. Luckily there are 75% who are more flexible.
    The anti English rhetoric worked on some, as most English in Scotland voted to stay part of UK instead of embracing their new country of residence. Those that voted YES were looked on quizzically by the MSM as if they were doing something they should be guilty about.
    The Daily Record clearly wants to carry on stating NO was justified instead of issuing a "we wuz robbed" mea culpa after Cam and Miliband ignored our Gordon's pleas to be taken seriously. UKIP/Tory vote makes up about 25% of Scotland and they will never want change. Problem for Clegg at the Record is most Labour voters want some change, if not a complete overhaul. Strangely that aspect did not enter his article.

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  2. I did a fairly in-depth online one with Populous on Scottish issues last night - lots of focus on Scottish Labour, some on next ref, etc. I presume a full Scottish sample as there was little of interest for the rUK.

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    1. Did it seem like internal Labour polling or was there more to it than that?

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  3. I wonder what the profile of the 28% looks like.

    I'd be willing to guess that a fair number of them are older people still concerned about the pension lies they were fed; the seriously rich worried that Scotland wouldn't turn so many blind eyes to tax avoidance/evasion or English nationals not wishing to live in a "foreign" country.

    I wonder how that fits in with the Record's reader profile.

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  4. 28% is roughly what the tories and labour hardcore unionist support is...

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  5. From the poll of polls this Survation poll strongly suggests that half of the 27% who now support Labour want another independence referendum.

    Labour are even failing to convince its dwindling number of supporters of its 'business as usual' stance over devolution.

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  6. I've always believed that there's a hardcore 25-30% support for the Union. That's the strong Brit-Jock, hardcore Rangers fans, white settler vote.

    I think 15 and 16 is too early though. In the meantime fight for further devolution - real devo. We all know they will not give anything as such and Smith will give us a series of small powers. We've already had a few big business leaders not wishing any form of Devo Max although they never wanted a parliament in 97 or it to have tax raising powers.

    Then it'll get interesting. SNP work with what they have, but can't bring powerful change to Scotland without these new powers. I have a feeling that if in 2015 (and they win in Scotland) yet a trickle of powers are offered yet nothing meaningful. We'll see another referendum in their 2016 manifesto, this time for Devo Max.

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  7. There's a nice offer at Ladbrokes for the number of SNP seats at the General Election next May.
    31+ is 3/1 for a maximum of £33.33.

    [url=http://www.oddschecker.com/politics/british-politics/next-uk-general-election/total-seats-snp-banded]http://www.oddschecker.com/pol...tal-seats-snp-banded[/url]

    The Electoral Calculus website is forecasting SNP getting 47 seats

    [url=http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/cgi-bin/usercode.pl?CON=15.44&LAB=26.61&LIB=5.52&NAT=43.48&region=AllScotland&boundary=2010&seat=All+Scotland+seats+majority-sorted]http://www.electoralcalculus.c...eats+majority-sorted[/url]

    I was told by Alex Salmond an hour ago that there's an opinion poll coming out tomorrow giving the SNP 50% in Scotland. Putting that in to Electoral Calculus gives a forecast of 51 seats.

    [url=http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/cgi-bin/usercode.pl?CON=15&LAB=26&LIB=5&NAT=50&region=AllScotland&boundary=2010&seat=All+Scotland+seats+majority-sorted]http://www.electoralcalculus.c...eats+majority-sorted[/url]

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    1. Heady stuff, but there's still more than five months to go. Call me a pessimist, but I can't see that sort of lead being maintained right up to polling day. Not with the BBC in full-blown "vote unionist" mode, and the inevitable exclusion of all dissenting voices from the airwaves.

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  8. If Scotland votes to stay in the Eu and Ruk decides to exit as far as I'm concerned that's a mandate to declare UDI. No need for another referendum.

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  9. If the Daily Record wants to pay for polls then fine, but otherwise, as its biased reading of the latest poll proves, it is a joke of a newspaper and should be boycotted.
    Hopefully it will not be long until the DR goes bust - along with The Scotsman.

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  10. "the results are nothing short of catastrophic for the narrative of "it's over, it was decisive, for heaven's sake let's all move on" that he and his spiritual overlord Mr Cameron (along with the rest of the London political and media establishment) have been trying to pedal for the last two months."

    Indeed. It's been laugh out loud funny watching out of touch westminster bubble twits desperately trying to spin the poll as a 'triumph' for the unionist parties and failing badly.

    Even more hilarious are the witless fools shrieking that it doesn't matter because westminster can somehow stop another referendum. They clearly aren't bright enough to grasp that the precedent has now very decisively been set. When the scottish public want another referendum then that is precisely what they will get. No amount of petulant foot stamping from terrified unionist leaders and their clueless lackeys can stop it.

    Meanwhile back in the real world in scotland the SNP conference was an incredible success and absolutely packed out. (From what I hear from applications they could have filled out the concert hall in Perth twice, the new members are that eager and fired up) The local branches are all moving up a gear and the meetings, fundraisers, and planning for 2015 are taking place up and down scotland right now.

    Also of note is this.

    THE SCOTTISH 45% @ScottishPleb · 6h

    Alex Salmond to auction off £1000s worth of gifts he received as FM, to aid three charities close to his heart http://mirr.im/1sXoeWG

    Mr Bradley @niallbtwit · 2h

    .@Cllr_McEleny I wonder if any of Scotland's top journalists will blog about this #ThanksAlex http://www.eveningexpress.co.uk/news/local/alex-salmond-donates-first-minister-pension-to-children-s-charity-1.687170 …


    Perhaps there's a reason that Alex and Nicola are the two most popular politicians in the UK while the out of touch westminster bubble twits are so despised by the public.

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