Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Panelbase datasets confirm genuine swing in favour of independence

After an unusually long delay, the datasets from this weekend's Panelbase poll have finally emerged. Of course the first thing I always look for with independence polls is whether the unrounded numbers are slightly better or worse for Yes than the headline numbers, and in this case the answer is 'better'.  In fact, the headline numbers effectively exaggerated the No lead by a full 1%.

Should Scotland be an independent country?

Yes 47.5%
No 52.5%

That suggests there has been a decent 2.8% swing to Yes since referendum day last September.  The breakdown by recalled referendum vote reveals the broad nature of that swing, and it's very much in line with the pattern shown by other polling firms in recent months - slightly more No voters (6%) than Yes voters (4%) have made a direct switch to the other side, and more No voters (6%) than Yes voters (3%) have drifted off to the Don't Knows.

As I suspected, weighting by recalled referendum vote has boosted No quite significantly in this poll.  The 480 respondents who recalled voting No have been upweighted to count as 506, and the 451 who recalled voting Yes have been downweighted to count as only 416.  It does look likely, therefore, that if Panelbase were still using their pre-referendum weighting scheme, Yes would have a very slight lead.  The superficial appearance from the headline numbers that nothing much has changed since the pre-referendum Panelbase polling (which often had Yes at around 47%) is highly misleading.

It's interesting to note that Panelbase are still suffering from the slightly mysterious problem that has plagued most online pollsters - they've got far too many English-born people in their unweighted sample, and are having to make a hefty adjustment to correct for that.  Among Scottish-born respondents, Yes have a narrow 51% to 49% lead, which heightens the sensitive nature of the finding that, by a 52% to 48% margin, Scottish-born respondents think the franchise for any future independence referendum should be restricted to Scottish-born people - in line with the "Cameron Doctrine" of excluding EU citizens who are resident in this country from the EU referendum.

74 comments:

  1. James: I think in earlier posts you referred to one other, post-September, Panelbase independence poll. What's the reason for you discounting the others (http://whatscotlandthinks.org/questions/how-would-you-vote-in-the-in-the-scottish-independence-referendum-if-held-now-a?groups=null&companies=[%2274df1b10-8d73-47d2-ad16-a1c0011d7415%22]#line) ? Was the methodology different?

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    1. You're quite right, David - what I said the other day was complete garbage. I was relying on a mixture of my own memory (which I think was faulty because the independence question was buried deep into the question sequence of what were essentially general election polls) and a list of polls which was obviously incomplete. I probably should have double-checked What Scotland Thinks, although I find the results section of that site isn't the most user-friendly.

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  2. Tragically, since ALL the shite since the referendum, YES is still behind.

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    1. A 3% annual swing to Yes would do me.

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    2. Got to remember how many people are still fully tuned into the MSM and the BBC. Additionally the Yes campaign has officially ended yet the No campaign doesn't seem to stop.. This is something that needs addressed, a Yes think tank would be a start.
      ..

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    3. http://nationalyesregistry.scot/

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    4. Can you join that as an individual? Looks as if it's only Yes groups .

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  3. Did it not work out that 54% of Scottish born did vote yes while 70% of those born outwith Scotland voted No

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  4. Did it not work out that 54% of Scottish born did vote yes while 70% of those born outwith Scotland voted No

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    1. Lots of us born in Scotland were not allowed to vote.

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    2. Polls have indicated that Yes was ahead amongst Scottish-born voters. But unless you're suggesting reworking the suffrage along ethnic lines, what's the relevance?

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    3. For as long as anyone is defending the Cameron Doctrine for the EU referendum, it's highly relevant to point out what the consequences would be if it was applied more widely. And on a point of pedantry (actually it's slightly more than a point of pedantry) country of birth is not the same thing as ethnicity.

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    4. I take the first point. But while it may be clumsy to conflate ethnic origin and birthplace, in this context there's no moral difference. Excluding people from voting because of the colour of their skin is unfair in the same way as excluding them because of where their parents had sex.

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    5. This one really is a point of pedantry, but country of birth is not the same thing as country of conception either.

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    6. One of my colleagues has just booked a New York vacation, but his wife will be just over 8 months pregnant at the time. The Doctor has given her the ok to fly, but U.S. visa authorities are distinctly unimpressed.

      They seem to have a default view that any pregnant woman flying in to the USA is trying get their baby a U.S. passport.

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    7. The 'Cameron doctrine' as you call it and the indyref franchise are not comparable.

      In the EU case the question is as to whether the UK (and as such the British people as a demos) will remain in the EU. As such the only logical franchise is that does not include non-UK citizens who we do not usually include in UK elections. UK elections meaning general elections in this context.

      Also with indyref one of the arguments for the franchise in use then was that it was the same franchise as was used to elect the government that gained the mandate to hold the referendum. Correct me if I'm wrong but the inclusion of EU citizens in such what are considered by the EU to be sub-national elections are a consequence of EU law.

      Further in the indyref, which was of course on the premise of the White Paper, that document made clear that those who were resident in Scotland at the time of either the referendum or independence (can't remember which) would be eligible for Scottish citizenship on grounds of that residence. The EU vote does not impact on the citizenship status of those 'excluded' from that referendum, even if it may impact on their rights to residency.

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    8. EU citizens who are resident in the UK have a very obvious stake in this referendum. In fact, they have much more at stake than anyone else, because their status in this country will change, so if that's the criteria it's an absolute outrage to exclude them.

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  5. james, what % do you think are soft No's?

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    1. I'm not sure there's any way of measuring that in this poll. 11% of people who say they would vote No in a new referendum were SNP voters in May. That doesn't necessarily make them soft Nos, but they might at least be more likely to to give Nicola Sturgeon a hearing on the subject.

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    2. Surely those who have voted Yes before are more likely to come back to the Yes side in a future vote ? Obviously the same applies to No voters but nothing wrong with wishful thinking in this weather.

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  6. The "Cameron Doctrine" is that all those eligible to vote in a UK general election are eligible to vote in a UK referendum.

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    1. Thus conveniently excluding TWO MILLION PEOPLE based on country of origin. Nice try, Simon.

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    2. Just applying the existing UK law, James. In the same way, the Scottish government "conveniently" excluded Scots not living in Scotland from voting last September.

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    3. Nope. There is no "existing law" being applied - a conscious decision is being made to invoke the Cameron Doctrine. And if you think the EU referendum franchise is identical to the general election franchise, I suggest you look more closely - because you're wrong about that.

      By the way, what are "Scots not living in Scotland"? Without Scottish independence or some form of Scottish citizenship, that term has no meaning. Sorry, Simon, but you can't have your cake and eat it.

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    4. Why does it not have meaning? We have Londoners, Northerners, Highlanders, Islanders, Glaswegians and all kinds of people. Independence is not a prerequisite for identity, either culturally or legally.

      There is obviously some kind of legal status for voting in the London Mayoral elections, despite it not being a country.

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    5. Your question is answered below.

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    6. Thus conveniently excluding TWO MILLION PEOPLE based on country of origin. Nice try, Simon.

      It seems likely that most of those two million would vote Yes, so how is this convenient for Cameron? Do you think he wants a No?

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    7. I think Cameron knows it would be a disaster for him if there was a narrow Yes vote which could be painted as having only been won by "giving bloody foreigners the vote".

      The Yes campaign is going to be quite comical if Cameron and Osborne are effectively leading it. The least enthusiastic Yes campaign in history.

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    8. "The Yes campaign is going to be quite comical if Cameron and Osborne are effectively leading it. "

      No "if" about it James. This is Cameron's referendum. He made it happen and he can hardly run away from it displaying his usual cowardice now.

      Labour and the lib dems are also hardly likely to jump in with both feet to eagerly support the tories in a referendum after they were annihilated following the first Indyref.

      What makes it even funnier is that if Cameron or Osbrowne try to choose someone else to do the heavy lifting - like Clarke, Heseltine, Clegg or Blair - it will inevitably cause utter fury in the tory party.

      Since, those lot would not just be the official voice of Cameron's pro-Europe campaign but also representing what Cameron and his pro-Europe chumocracy at the top of the tory party want to be official tory party policy from now on.

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    9. 700,000 votes is many things....but annihilation it is not

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    10. The westminster election is FPTP not PR, dumbass.

      3 out of 59 MPs for the unionist parties in scotland is self-evidently them being annihilated.

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    11. Annihilation means total destruction, so I suppose Anonymous is right enough. Better just to say that Labour and the Lib Dems lost just over 96% of their MPs. Down but not defeated!

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  7. A decision has been made to use law previously applied to all other UK referendums to the EU referendum.

    OK - so I am not a Scot. Interesting.

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    1. As Scotland is not an independent country, with Scottish citizenship codified as a defined thing people either have or do not have, it's a meaningless term in this context. How can you compile a list of British citizens living outwith Scotland who have a right to this nebulous status?

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    2. You can start by looking at their birth certificates.

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    3. Are you seriously suggesting that an entirely new electoral register be set up, with people having to produce a birth certificate to get on it?

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    4. Oh for heaven's sake, Simon, how much money would that waste in admin costs? I thought you cared about Scotland's fiscal position?

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    5. @Rolfe - you can add to the existing one. It's not hard. But clearly it is very "convenient" to ensure that Scots living outside Scotland are prevented from voting in any future referendum. I wonder why.

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    6. @Rolfe - you can add to the existing one. It's not hard. But clearly it is very "convenient" to ensure that Scots living outside Scotland are prevented from voting in any future referendum. I wonder why.

      If you're going to base the franchise on an accident of birth, you'd then have to exclude Scots who were born elsewhere. I don't think it's clear that would be a net gain for No.

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    7. Wouldn't be so sure on that on Jeff. I was an expat Scot in Oil & Gas for about half of my career, and generally they're a lot more patriotic than you might imagine.

      They tend to be a a lot less narrow minded about foreigners, but they also tend to be a lot prouder and have more affection for their home country in absentia. A mix of nostalgia and rose coloured glasses.

      In my experience non-resident Scots would be a net Yes.

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    8. I lived in England for almost 25 years. If the independence referendum had happened in that time, I would have done whatever it took to get myself a vote so that I could vote Yes.

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  8. Going to be interesting watching the 'Hammer blow for the union' today as George delivers the first Tory budget in nearly 2 decades.

    With the threat of rebellion over the EU making Cameron's majority tenuous*, Tories are going to be as nasty as they can be as quickly as they can be.

    ---

    *Labour are no threat to the Tories; they will just keep on voting with the Tories or abstaining for the foreseeable

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  9. Any right-wingers want to take a stab at explaining why Tory and UKIP May 2015 voters are the most keen at disenfranchising the English, Welsh and N. Irish living in Scotland in a future iref?

    While 46% of Tories think they should get a vote, this is only 1% above the (nearly half) 45% who think they should not get a vote.

    For skippers, it's 63% against people from the rUK living in Scotland getting a vote, with just 23% for.

    Feel that togetherness.

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    1. Because they're jingoistic flag-waving headcases who think that the place your parents were living when they had a baby is more important than what you are like as a person?

      There seems to be a lot of it about these days. Makes you wonder, doesn't it?

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  10. Why are SNP members voting NO?

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    1. Could be a number of reasons, not wanting to encourage an immediate referendum could be one? It doesn't necessarily mean they would vote that way on the day.

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    2. Did it say anything about SNP members? I thought the figures referred to SNP voters. North of 1.5 million people vote SNP, people from a wide range of political viewpoints. There are "only" about 120,000 actual party members.

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  11. Among Scottish-born respondents, Yes have a narrow 51% to 49% lead, which heightens the sensitive nature of the finding that, by a 52% to 48% margin, Scottish-born respondents think the franchise for any future independence referendum should be restricted to Scottish-born people - in line with the "Cameron Doctrine" of excluding EU citizens who are resident in this country from the EU referendum.

    This is undemocratic and out of tune with SNP policy. I was born in England but have Scottish blood. I live in Scotland, pay my rates and taxes and have every right to vote as I please. As an SNP member I voted YES because that is what I believe. To deny me that right is as bad as Cameron's views. No Scot would want to be compared with Cameron surely?

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    1. Yes, it's depressing that 52% of Scots-born voters (assuming the poll is accurate) are racist.

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    2. Ditto born in England with Scottish blood but had given up my British Passport for a Maltese one (hey, great being in the Commonwealth). I would gladly give up my Yes vote if it gave the Yes a lead, but then, it would be very undesireable for the SNP to be moving along undemocratic lines as the Tories propose in EU referendum. And I know that this is not democratic, but it would be those who retire to Scotland that are predominantly NO voters. If only we could exclude the over 65s, who have not lived here before retiring. (would have never suggested this except for wishing for a resounding independence result)

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    3. Slightly silly comment, Keaton - according to the poll, 40% of respondents IN ENGLAND AND WALES agree that the franchise should be restricted to Scottish-born people. Are those respondents being racist against themselves?

      I don't agree with restricting the franchise, but I don't see how people who support the idea can logically be criticised now that we know what the plans are for the EU referendum.

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    4. Unless we're criticising them both, in which case it's both logical and consistent.

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    5. I don't see they can logically be defended by those who oppose Cameron's plans for the referendum franchise.

      Yes, people in England and Wales who think a person's right to vote should be determined by their place of birth, and not by whether the consequences of the vote will directly affect them, are equivalent to racists.

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    6. I think that's a very tough case to make, Keaton.

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    7. I can see a reasonable case for criticising people who want to restrict the franchise in that way, but to call it racist is to debase the term racist until it is stripped of its normally-understood meaning.

      I think it's a slap in the face to anyone who has experienced real racism or race discrimination to bandy the term around as a casual insult against people who simply hold a different political opinion. Does holding the opinion that temporary residents in a country should not be allowed to vote on the long-term future of the country really equate to calling someone a "dirty nigger"?

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    8. I would say it depended on why one held such a view. I can broadly think of 3 reasons :

      1) They don't think non-ethnic born nationals are going to be affected by the result. In which case I'd call them severely deluded. And possibly off their meds.

      2) They think it'll make it more likely for their side to win. In which case I'd call them a gutter-dwelling political opportunist of precisely the kind the people on this site claim to despise and want to replace.

      3) They think the views of non-native residents don't count for as much as those of native born residents. In which case I think racist is a pretty good description.

      To be honest, none of those are particularly great though. I can't think of a *good* reason to disenfranchise someone from either an EU or a Scottish referendum purely based on their country of birth. Just nasty ones.

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    9. I think it's a slap in the face to anyone who has experienced real racism or race discrimination to bandy the term around as a casual insult against people who simply hold a different political opinion.

      I didn't say that anyone who holds a different political opinion from me is a racist. I don't think anyone else on here has said that either.

      Does holding the opinion that temporary residents in a country should not be allowed to vote on the long-term future of the country really equate to calling someone a "dirty nigger"?

      No. But again, I don't think anyone's claimed such a thing. You don't think there are degrees of racism? Nothing short of using a vicious racial slur will qualify? The question was whether it's just to deprive people of their democratic voice in a crucial issue on the basis of where they come from. If someone believes that, they're xenophobic. One could quibble with "racist", but only on the semantic grounds that we're discriminating on basis of country of origin, rather than strictly ethnicity.

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  12. Hmm, why did the times run this story instead of the more pertinent 'Scots like the English more than the other way around' findings:

    http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/uk_news/scotland/article1577379.ece

    Panelbase tables show 22% of English voters see Scottish people negatively. Only 15% of Scots say the same which is, within MoE, the same as the 13% of English (born) living in Scotland who dislike English people!

    Anyway, every time someone says Scots are anti-English, we now have a nice poll to quote. Thanks Times!

    http://www.panelbase.com/media/polls/W7181w1st.pdf

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    1. To clarify:

      Panelbase tables show 22% of English voters see Scottish people negatively. Only 15% of Scots say the same about the English, which is, within MoE, the same as the 13% of English (born) living in Scotland who dislike English people!

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    2. Which raises the next question; is the increased dislike of Scots by the English (per the poll) a cause, or is it a symptom?

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    3. I was merely highlighting the hypocrisy of the Times - stones and glass houses etc.

      However, I expect the right wing media + Tories + UKIP politicians have not helped cross border relations...

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  13. I would think some non-native born Scottish residents who chose to vote NO in the Referendum have no intention of continuing to live in Scotland after their current employment terminates. It would be a waste of money to set up a new electoral register simply to exclude them but it would cost nothing to ask them to desist from voting in IndyRef 2. I can imagine strong unionists might find it hard to do so but if they have any honour and respect for the citizens of Scotland they should leave the decision to those intending to make Scotland their home, regardless of where they were born.

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    1. What about non-native scottish residents who voted YES but may leave in the future should those be barred?

      Let's face it the qualifiers for who should be barred in gnat minds boils down to everyone who may vote NO :-D

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    2. Conversely, there are almost certainly native born Scottish residents who chose to vote YES while intending to leave. Mainly among the younger generation, where a percentage of each year move abroad either for work, study or relationship/family reasons.

      Would we exclude those too? What if they end up not moving? Or coming back? What if your non-native people above don't end up moving?

      And if we're going to extend that logic, shouldn't we invite into the vote people who are planning to move here after the referendum but won't make it in time?

      You cannot base your criteria on maybes and future possibilities. You are absolutely right that we should have the decision for the people who live in Scotland. But grilling anyone, native or otherwise about their future career plans is not the way to go about it.

      Give the vote to people who live in the country at the time of voting. Have a pre-qualification period of a year or so, if you must.

      But don't go self-selecting the 'right' electorate. That's a very dark road and it doesn't lead anywhere good.

      And this all goes doubly for the EU referendum. Disenfranchising *any* UK residents simply because of their place of birth is anti-democratic.

      Where you are born should not matter. I'm Scottish, but I was a child of the Royal Navy. A month earlier and I would have been Singaporean, 3 months later and I would have been German. Should that really make a difference? To anything? If anyone thinks the answer is yes, then we are on fundamentally different sides.

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    3. I'm a Nat, and I don't think that. So stop making sweeping statements like an imbecile.

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  14. Let's not beat about the bush. Salmond chose residency as the basis for the referendum because while it brought in half a million non-scots born uk residents who were going to be heavily no, it excluded more (750,000) scottish-born citizens who now lived in the rest of the uk, who again would have been heavily no for the same reason i.e. they're not going to vote to make themselves foreigners. It was maths, not democracy, and anyone who thinks the SNP hadn't done the maths beforehand can't think that highly of them. You lot are so transparent :-D

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    1. Even if Scots expats are as xenophobic as you allege, and even if the SNP calculation was as you claim, it was still the only morally correct choice. When Elaine Murray and many others from your side argued that the franchise should be based on ethnicity (except that those half-million non-Scots-born No voters should be included too, of course), I suspect that wasn't particularly based on high principle either.

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    2. I agree with keaton, and I was a No.

      The Scottish Referendum was probably the most inclusive and non-restrictive vote in UK political history, and I think the upcoming EU ref is a step backwards from that high water mark.

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  15. There that bogeyman being mentioned again.....yawn. Give it up!

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  16. So the budget heralds another vicious attack against the disabled, the least well off and the vulnerable by the out of touch overprivileged tory twit Osbrowne.

    Remember all those voters during the election who were too ashamed to admit they voted for the nasty party? Well it looks like we are heading straight down that John Major road yet again.

    All it needs is a tiny majority for the tories, an EU crisis and a looming and inevitable split in the tory party to make Cameron's transformation into John Major complete.

    Oh that's right! We're already there. ;-)

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  17. 41% of C2DE's supported the union in the latest panelbase (vs 53% for indy).

    Dave et al. just put huge numbers of these people on the scrap heap, taking away any reason they had to back the union.

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  18. Wow, what a load of racists seem to have appeared.
    I'm enjoying watching Le Tour, and rooting for Chris Froome. He is always referred to as British, yet was born in Namibia, spent all his life in Namibia, and speaks with a Namibian 'English' accent.
    Why is he British?

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  19. Assuming this is not a trick question, is it because he cycles for Britain? Has done for the better part of a decade.

    Also, not to nitpick, but :

    a) He's from Kenya
    b) His accent is South African (on account of him growing up there)
    c) There's not really any such thing as a Namibian English accent. I used to work there, and they mostly speak German, it being a former colony.

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    1. Froomedawg is Kenyan born, raised in South Africa and lives as a tax exile in Monaco.

      He's almost as British as Zola Budd and Mo Farah. Or all those Quatari athletes from Nairobi.

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