Monday, May 2, 2016

Merciless electorate metes out more misery to Kalamity Kez as bombshell Survation telephone poll puts Labour third

What I presume will be the last pre-election edition of Survation's regular series of polls for Cleggy and the Vow-Meisters has been released tonight.  As they've done before, the Record have chosen to splash out on a much more expensive telephone poll just before election day.  That's a very useful exercise, because it means we no longer have all our eggs in one basket as far as phone polling is concerned (the basket being Ipsos-Mori).  But it also means that the percentage changes listed by David Clegg on his Twitter feed, showing among other things a seemingly dramatic drop in the Green list vote, are completely meaningless.  Even if other aspects of the methodology have remained the same, you just can't make any sort of direct comparison between the last Survation online poll and tonight's phone poll.

Constituency ballot :

SNP 49%
Labour 21%
Conservatives 19%
Liberal Democrats 7%

Regional list ballot :

SNP 43%
Conservatives 20%
Labour 19%
Greens 7%
Liberal Democrats 6%
UKIP 2%

As far as the battle between Labour and the Tories is concerned, the new figures are uncannily similar to the recent Ipsos-Mori telephone poll, which also had Labour just ahead on the constituency ballot, but trailing on the list.  This underlines the foolishness of journalists who seized upon a single Panelbase poll at the weekend as proof that Labour had more or less won the fight for second place.  However, it remains the case that there is a bigger question mark over list polling than constituency polling, and that there tends to be a strong correlation between a party's fortunes on the constituency ballot and the list ballot - meaning, in my opinion, that this poll still points to a Labour advantage, but only just.  If it really is as close as it appears, differential turnout could decide it - and although that's factored into the headline numbers of the polls, there's no way of knowing for sure that it's being factored in accurately (as the events of last year demonstrated).  Tory supporters are generally more motivated to vote, but Scottish Parliament elections also tend to be 'away fixtures' for the Conservatives.

My own feeling remains that Labour will hold on to second place, probably with a bit to spare, but it's getting harder and harder to claim that's an assessment supported by compelling evidence from the polls.

Since I wrote the opening paragraph of this post, I've had a chance to look at the Survation datasets, and it turns out that data collection method isn't the only methodological factor that differentiates this poll from the last online Survation poll - the firm have finally addressed the long-running concerns over the way they pose the regional list question, which until now has seemed to directly lead a minority of respondents to wrongly think they're being asked for a second preference, thus artificially boosting the reported vote shares for the Greens and UKIP.  The change that's been made is subtle, but it could well be enough to explain the fact that the Greens are 4% lower than in the last Survation poll.  That said, arguably the real benchmark for the Greens should be the impressive 10% they received in the Ipsos-Mori phone poll, so from that point of view tonight's findings are still disappointing for them.  OK, if they actually get 7% of the vote on Thursday, they stand to gain several seats - but we know from past elections that late polls have a habit of overstating the Greens' support.  As things stand, I wouldn't be surprised if the Greens win only two or three seats, but neither would I be surprised if they win seven or eight.

This poll is also another massive warning shot for any SNP supporter who is tempted by the idea of "tactical voting on the list", because it's only the third poll in the last twelve months to put the SNP below 50% on the constituency ballot - and two of those three polls have come in the space of the last 48 hours.  Two of the five regular pollsters are now saying the SNP constituency vote is just 4% higher than it was in 2011, when the party required a minimum of twelve list seats for an overall majority.  We're now well into territory where only a relatively small polling error, or a relatively small late swing (or a bit of both) could cost the SNP their overall majority if their own supporters abandon them in sufficient numbers on the list ballot.  I've said it before and I'll say it again for the benefit of the likes of Kevin Williamson, who was mocking my stance before this poll was released - the idea that "everyone knows" the SNP will win a majority on constituency seats alone, and that there is polling evidence that can convincingly support that contention, is fatuous.  It may happen, but it's very much in the balance.

It'll be interesting to see (and we may have to wait 24 hours to find out) whether an independence question was asked in this poll.  If by any chance it was, it would - incredibly - be only the third independence poll conducted by telephone since the referendum in September 2014.  The previous two were both carried out by Ipsos-Mori, and both showed a Yes lead - so we really need to find out whether that's a phone effect or an Ipsos-Mori effect.  (There are undoubtedly people who already know the answer to that question, because it's an open secret that Survation have been commissioned on multiple occasions to conduct private telephone polls on independence and other subjects - although we don't know who the client was.)

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SCOT GOES POP POLL OF POLLS

Constituency ballot :

SNP 50.7% (-0.6)
Labour 21.2% (+0.5)
Conservatives 17.7% (+0.4)
Liberal Democrats 6.2% (n/c)

Regional list ballot :

SNP 44.7% (n/c)
Labour 19.8% (+0.3)
Conservatives 18.3% (+0.3)
Greens 7.7% (-0.6)
Liberal Democrats 5.5% (-0.2)

(The Poll of Polls is based on a rolling average of the most recent poll from each of the firms that have reported Scottish Parliament voting intention numbers over the previous three months, and that adhere to British Polling Council rules. At present, there are six - Panelbase, Survation, BMG, YouGov, TNS and Ipsos-Mori. Whenever a new poll is published, it replaces the last poll from the same company in the sample.)

Explanatory note : As a fond tribute to the mainstream media's restrained take on the GERS report, Scot Goes Pop headlines will feature 50% bonus hysteria for an indefinite period.

43 comments:

  1. Sarah Smiths pout just got bigger and Glen Campbell's whine just got more ear piercing. I think Union Jackie's head will be spinning faster than a centrifuge on speed.

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  2. Scotland votes predictor is saying only 65 constituency seats on these figures. List seats crucial

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    1. 65 is a majority of one. And apparently there is no ban on the presiding officer voting - so the SNP could form a single party majority government. But one rebel could sink it.

      I think the SNP's best days are behind them even if they do win this thing. I know I'm not exactly impartial but I can't really see where it goes from here other than numerous chickens coming home to roost and infighting over fracking and indy. Even Brexit isn't panning out for them as a quick way back into the game, with polls indicating a statistical tie on independence in that event.

      It's all downhill from here.

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    2. Look everybody. Blair McDougall thinks the SNP are BAAAAAAAAAAAAD!

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    3. you would think that ,however the voting public may not agree...,As Prof Curtiss says if independence is a one way street and the yoons are fighting over what is left...
      As more people travel down this path ,the "what is left " gets smaller ,and maybe the public will forgive anything the SNP will do until the goal is achieved .then real politics can emerge ,
      Until that time, all the unionist can do is watch support wither and die as all the lies told before the indyref really do come home to roost .

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    4. Back in the real world though, politics will not be placed on hold pending an event that may never be achieved - or may even be undesirable. Normal voting patterns will begin to re emerge. The SNP 3rd term is basically booby trapped. Fracking / indy battles / failure to tackle poverty / the return of council tax hikes will all come together to hurt them quite badly. And let's keep in mind we don't need a massive shift in opinion to reinstate a unionist majority - due to the nature of the Holyrood voting system. A transfer of 10% from SNP back to the unionist parties will suffice - easily achievable in the space of 5 years.

      Tick tock.

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    5. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    6. Fast forward 4 years to 2020. Tory government re-elected with majority (Boris?). Support for independence has risen gradually from bedrock of 45% to well over 50%. Prospect of yet another 5 years of a government Scotland didn't vote for.
      Scotland will be an independent country before 2025.

      You're deluded.

      Tick tock.

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    7. Scotland isn't going anywhere with a 10% deficit. Tory governments don't need to have much impact on Scotland with extensive new devolved powers.

      Tick tock.

      Aldo

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    8. Aldo, just a couple of days ago, you were warning some of the more optimistic Nats that "none of us knows the future", and that we couldn't have predicted the present situation in 2006. Yet of course here you are again, telling us that the downfall of the SNP is inevitable and imminent.

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    9. You are, of course, correct - no one knows the future. But we can take a guess at it, based on previous events. Governments tend to do badly in their 3rd term for a number of different reasons. The SNP needs to get to 14 years in power and still be on around 40% + of the vote - a tall order. If they can't pull it off, they lose control of the parliament in 5 years' time. I would say that is the likely outcome.

      Aldo

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    10. Extensive? really you believe that? all traps and we know it,as an ordinary citizen I know its all traps and no real power.Westminster is giving local authorities more powers to circumvent Holyrood,as its not panned out as they had hoped,but next years local elections will give us plenty more SNP controlled councils,with all the powers to councils and what little Holyrood has its De Facto independence.Aye its coming just hope I live long enough to see it another 10 years for me is an ambition.

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    11. You can have socialism in Scotland, if it's what you really want. You just have to raise the taxation locally, in Scotland, to pay for it. It's what we'd have to do post independence anyway - but with far less protection for our economy.

      I wouldn't bank on the SNP getting control of loads of councils next year. The STV system dilutes the effect of the SNP's popularity compared with other parties. At the moment, the vast majority of Scottish councils are no overall control. There is a patch of yellow around Dundee / Angus and a patch of red around Glasgow. The rest is black. I expect it will remain so.

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  3. Of course this could be the Daily Redcoat bigging up the Tories in some vain effort to get the Labour vote out as much as possible.

    So this was a phone poll conducted on a Sunday and May Day. If I have read the initial data I have seen correctly that is. Dont such polls come with huge health warnings traditionally?

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  4. Based on this poll, Scotland Votes shows:
    SNP 69 (-)
    CON 24 (+9)
    LAB 23 (-14)
    GREEN 7 (+5)
    LIBDEM 6 (+1)

    The polls in the last week of the 2011 election underestimated the SNP vote by several points, overestimated the LAB vote by several points and slightly underestimated the CON vote. If repeated on Thursday, LAB are in deep trouble.

    I think SNP are going to perform better than the polls are suggesting - edging towards mid 50%. LAB and CON will be in low to mid 20s, it's that close between them. LIBDEM will be same or give or take a seat - and GREENS just above LIBDEM, with maybe 6.

    If you had to put a gun to ma heid, here's my prediction in seats to date (subject to slight variations before Thursday):
    SNP 74
    LAB 23
    CON 21
    GREEN 6
    LIBDEM 5

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    1. "The polls in the last week of the 2011 election underestimated the SNP vote by several points"

      That's not really true, unless you're referring to the list ballot. A number of polls were bang on the money as far as the SNP's constituency vote was concerned - and Progressive Scottish Opinion actually overestimated them by 6%.

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    2. Sorry, I should have said the last month - under by around 2/3% on average.

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    3. As I've pointed out before, one source of extra constituency votes will be the Greens. It looks like they make up most of the 3.4% who said Another Party in Survation and the Panelbase poll gave them 3%. With only 3 Green candidates most will have to vote elsewhere and maybe 75% will go to the SNP (as many did last May with more opportunities). That should give the SNP about 2 points boost in the constituencies.

      Incidentally Survation don't seem to have asked explicitly about RISE and or Solidarity on the list, which may distort things slightly (Panelbase got 2% for RISE in the regions).

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  5. Arguably the 'national question' has prevented the emergence of normal politics in both parts of Ireland for 100 years.

    I do hope we don't have tactical voting arguments all that time.

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  6. I am 65 and have lived under 45 years of graft, corruption ,lies and deceit from labour and tories all my life , I cannot understand why anyone would vote for these lying parasites now ,when we now have an SNP SG that has been improving things gradually, admittedly they have more to do but that can be monitored and we will hold them accountable, I personally have had enough of the lying and corruption visited on Scotland and the Scots by these unionist self serving parasites , I hope my fellow Scots decimate the unionist votes and follow me by voting SNPx2

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    1. Absolutely. Not to mention that the SNP government having achieved so much in a short time, against huge odds. They really are working wonders when you consider the devastation being caused by the unionist, UK gov in england, and of course their attempts to destroy what remains of industry in Scotland.
      Unless the SNP secure a majority and preferably as large as possible, then the yoons will take things backwards and lay waste to Scotland big time. SNPx2 is the only way to keep up the momentum of good government in Scotland, anything else is terrifying.

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    2. Unless the SNP secure a majority and preferably as large as possible, then the yoons will take things backwards and lay waste to Scotland big time.

      Why should this be true? They failed to do that in the 2007 parliament, and on Thursday we're basically guaranteed far more pro-indy MSPs than we had then.

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  7. I was surveyed by Survation yesterday, so I don't know if it was for this poll. But the caller did seem in a rush.....

    Questions were about how I would vote and how I voted previously for SG, and for Indy Ref. But no question about future Indy Ref that I can recall.

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    1. That is the poll that we are discussing as Survation polled on the 1st and 2nd May.

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  8. Ruth's pitch to the uglier extremes of Unionism won't work, she may attract a small number of extra votes but her party's vote remains confined to farmers and pensioners. Labour will hold on to second place.

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    1. I expect so. Which is a shame for the indy movement: it would've been nice for the main face of the Unionist opposition to be a Conservative.

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    2. Ruth Davidson is well respected however - and good in debate. She would land a considerable number of blows on wee nippy. She may also raise the profile of conservatism - a major force in most democracies yet rejected in Scotland because of a dead woman.

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  9. Seems our SNP and Yes 2014 voters had better things to do than answer the poll. Very heavily No and Con/Lab in the unweighted base.

    I plan to just quietly go out and vote SNP-SNP on Thursday. Haven't bothered answering requests to be polled for a while now myself.

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    1. The contrast between the latest Survation (f/w 1-2 May) which is a phone one (landline and mobile - though they don't state the split) and the previous April one (f/w 15-20 April) which was online is quite striking.

      One notable difference is that (unusually) this poll found fewer Yes voters than expected (41%) while online polls normally find too many (50% in the Survation April). Obviously this is weighted for, but it hints at other possible disparities between the modes, which is why James says not to look at the changes too seriously.

      There's at least one other difference which is odd. Previous Survations have had a very small sample from South Scotland, not only unweighted, but weighted as well (54 to 70 in April, but previous polls have been similar) while this phone poll is a more realistic (139 to 129). That should have suppressed the Tory vote in previous polls, though the May sample for South looks a lot lighter blue than you would expect.

      There may also be a problem with the Green vote as well which doesn't seem to be weighted for normally. They seem to include only half the 2015 voters you would expect - you can't tell from the usual online tables, but it's possible that previous polls have included too many. So the drop may be more apparent than real.

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    2. Oddly, online often find too many Yes voters, yet at the same time, not enough SNP voters in the same sample. Survation online tends to show this but it pops up to varying degrees in most online 2014 weighted polls.

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    3. Or to clarify better, the Yes vote seems disproportionately high for the number of SNP vs e.g. Lab Con Lib.

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  10. I hope the SNP put a small bomb in the works before Thursday, if only to waken up the apathetic!
    How about demanding the return of 6000sq miles of stolen Scottish Sea, by the Labour Party, hours before the sitting of the first Scottish Parliament in April 1999?
    It just so happened that the area contained six oil wells.

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    1. Six oil wells that are now useless as they can't turn a profit.

      Is the previous Labour government's redrawing of the boundaries in keeping with international law and conventions? If so, no case to answer.

      Aldo

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    2. Aye, ye cannae give north sea wells away at the moment. Folk insist on paying multiple millions to take them off your hands.

      http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-business-35301162

      http://www.heraldscotland.com/business/company_news/14393319.North_Sea_focused_Independent_Oil___Gas_secures_growth_funding/

      http://www.ineos.com/news/ineos-group/ineos-buys-north-sea-gas-fields

      etc, etc. If you've got cash in the bank, you are buying right now.

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    3. Yes, you buy up when something is rock bottom in the hope of future profits. I understand that. But it's only "in hope" of future profits. They may not materialise.

      The British government also makes it attractive to buy - by offering bailouts, tax incentives and by actually paying for decommissioning. Nice business if you can get into it: "come on in, dig some holes, make some money - and when you're done we'll clean up your mess!"

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    4. Why are the Tories trying to encourage investment in the industry? So they can make a loss for the UK long term? This is important as they are a choice on the ballot Thursday. If you are saying they are economically incompetent, I need to know.

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    5. Ha! Like you were going to vote for them anyway!

      The natural position of the tories on this sort of stuff is to let the market take its course. But if they did that you'd be screaming "tory bastards - look what they're doing to Scotland!!"

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  11. # Aldo

    According to Craig Murray, who is expert on the Laws of the Seas, it was not in keeping with the international legislation. We wos robbed.

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    1. The sea border can either be an extension of the land border, projected out to sea, or an extension of the course of the nearest river to the land border, where it flows into the sea. Both are legit ways of carving up sea territory. The British government switched from one to the other - obviously to hurt the cause of nationalism. But if what they did was legal, there is nothing you can do. It is not an issue if we remain a United Kingdom as we share it all anyway - and if the N Sea oil industry is snookered anyway, it becomes a total non issue.

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    2. Aldo.
      You are making it up as you go along.
      The Continental Shelf is the dividing line between European/Scandinavian waters and UK waters. The Act is the Continental Shelf Jurisdiction Act 1964 (Geneva).
      When Scottish lawyers raised the prospect of legal jurisdiction in the Scottish part of the North Sea, the UK Government and Europe agreed on a second Act, the Continental Shelf Jurisdiction Act 1968 (London) which drew a line from Berwick straight across to the Continental Shelf. The line is parallel 55degrees 50 North.
      The signings in Geneva and London were by all parties involved and can only be changed by ALL parties.

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    3. Then why isn't the SNP challenging it then?

      Aldo

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    4. The Scotland-England maritime border has no status in international law - being, as it is, a domestic arrangement with the UK state. Upon independence iScotland and rUK would negotiate a new boundary, in a process that would be internationally arbitrated. It is believed that the most likely outcome is a border even less favourable to Scotland than the current one - as the international community attempts to be even handed in their distribution of resources between the two states.

      Like I said, a complete non issue.

      http://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/scottish-independence-legal-warning-over-north-sea-1-3105828

      Aldo

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  12. Aldo.
    Perhaps you know better, but until you give us your evidence, I suggest you keep your council, and actually watch Craig Murray's film, or better still contact him direct.

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