Drama as Panelbase release their datasets : it turns out half of the Scottish public want a second indyref within TWO years, not three

As I mentioned in the post about the new Panelbase poll, I was having to take all the information from John Curtice's What Scotland Thinks website, because Panelbase hadn't released their datasets yet.  It turns out that there were a few inaccuracies on What Scotland Thinks.  I would normally just update the original post, but I think the surgery required would be a bit too drastic in this case - it would even involve altering the title.  Here's what you need to know...

* Panelbase significantly changed their wording from previous polls on the question relating to the timing of a second independence referendum.  They no longer asked about whether there should be a referendum "in the next two or three years" (option 1) or "in about two or three years" (option 2), but instead changed that to "in the next year or two" (option 1) or "in about two years" (option 2).  So the half of respondents who gave a pro-referendum answer were indicating that they wanted an indyref within a maximum of just TWO years, not three.  The most important point here is that the change in wording means that the results are not directly comparable with the previous polls in the series.  Much has been made in certain quarters about the supposed drop in support for an early referendum, but that's based on a misconceived comparison of apples and oranges - of course you're going to get a slightly smaller figure if you ask about a tighter timescale.

* What Scotland Thinks wrongly reported opposition to an early second indyref as standing at 50%.  After rounding, the correct figure is 51%.  The unrounded figures are 49.4% in favour of a referendum within two years, and 50.5% opposed to a referendum "in the next few years" (which is slightly contradictory wording, incidentally).  That remains a statistical tie, in any case - meaning that you can't tell which side is really in the lead, due to the standard 3% margin of error.

* Panelbase haven't changed the wording of their headline independence question, but as a commenter pointed out on the earlier thread, that wording arguably leaves a little to be desired.  It asks people about a scenario in which "the referendum" is held "again" tomorrow.  That conditions people to think of Indyref 2 as a straight re-run of a vote that has already taken place, and possibly steers them back towards the way they voted in September 2014.  It would be better to have a more neutral wording of "If a referendum on Scottish independence was held tomorrow, how would you vote in response to the question 'Should Scotland be an independent country?'".  Perhaps that would make no difference in practice, but it would still be the right thing to do as a matter of principle.  Put it this way : if you wanted to find out how people plan to vote in the next UK general election, you wouldn't ask them "if the 2015 general election was held again tomorrow, how would you vote?"

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