Should Scotland be an independent country? (Panelbase)
Yes 50% (+1)
No 50% (-1)
This is highly significant, in spite of what on the face of it are minor changes that are well within the margin of error. In recent times, Panelbase (along with YouGov) have been very much on the No-friendly end of the polling spectrum. For an eighteen month period between the spring of 2017 and the autumn of 2018, every Panelbase poll that was published put Yes somewhere between 43% and 45%, with 44% being the most common figure - in other words Panelbase were suggesting that independence support had gone backwards (albeit only slightly) since the 2014 referendum. But from the end of last year onwards, the Yes figure has almost imperceptibly crept up and up and up, from 45% to 47%, then to 48%, then to 49%, and now to 50%. There has been no single poll in which we could say with confidence that the increase from the previous poll was genuine - but over a period of time the swing to Yes has self-evidently been real and statistically significant.
This is the first Panelbase poll since June 2016 not to show a No lead. Indeed it's only the second poll from any firm since 2017 not to show a No lead, with the other one being the famous Lord Ashcroft poll during the summer that had Yes slightly ahead - and it was hard to know what to make of that one, because Ashcroft is not a regular independence pollster, and there were no baseline figures to measure from. We've arguably been a bit unlucky that No-friendly pollsters have dominated the field of late - apart from that one Ashcroft poll, every independence poll that has been published this year has been conducted by either YouGov or Panelbase. (Unless of course you count the Survation poll commissioned by Scotland in Union that purported to be about independence but in fact asked a completely different question.) It's entirely possible that if the likes of Survation and Ipsos-Mori had been polling regularly, we'd have seen a fair few Yes leads recently.
In case you're wondering, the new figures are not part of the ongoing results from the Panelbase poll commissioned by Wings (which was confined to SNP voters only) - the Sunday Times were the client for this one, and they go out of their way to make the point that 50% is an all-time high for Yes in Panelbase polls for the Sunday Times. Which is absolutely lovely, but bear in mind that the client doesn't usually make any difference to how Panelbase conduct their independence polling, and the all-time high for Yes with Panelbase is the 52% recorded in the immediate aftermath of the EU referendum in June 2016. So we're almost back up to that kind of level of support but not quite.
(Since writing the above paragraph, I've doublechecked and it turns out that the June 2016 poll was actually commissioned by the Sunday Times anyway! They've obviously forgotten about that one.)
I don't pay the Murdoch Levy and can therefore only see the first few paragraphs of the Sunday Times piece, but it appears there was also a supplementary question that invited respondents to make a straight choice between Scotland staying as part of the UK after Brexit, and independence within the EU. I haven't found the exact figures yet, but on that question there is majority support for independence within the EU. That'll be food for thought for the minority within the SNP who believe that the road to a Yes win involves watering down the party's outright Remain stance and embracing the EFTA option.
UPDATE: It looks like the forced choice question asked whether independence-in-Europe or precious-union-in-Brexit would be better for Scotland economically, which perhaps puts a slightly different complexion on it. But 45% of respondents chose independence-in-Europe and only 35% chose precious-union-in-Brexit, which with Don't Knows excluded must be roughly a 56% to 44% split. That's very much "decisive" in BBC terms.
Here are the Westminster voting intention numbers from the poll:
SNP 39% (+1)
Conservatives 21% (+3)
Labour 20% (+3)
Liberal Democrats 13% (n/c)
Brexit Party 5% (-4)
Greens 2% (n/c)
Seats projection: SNP 48, Conservatives 5, Liberal Democrats 5, Labour 1
Do those seat numbers look oddly familiar? That'll be because they're identical to the projection from the average of YouGov subsamples that I published the other day - which is really odd given that those subsamples are "piddly" and "meaningless" (ahem). But is this surprising? Not at all. As I've patiently pointed out about 7548 times over the last few years (and I can't force Somerset-based scribes to take this on board, but it is actually true), YouGov subsamples are different from those of other firms, because they're correctly structured and weighted. When there's a long gap between full-scale Scottish polls, as we've just had, the next-best way to get a sense of the state of play is to average several recent YouGov subsamples, which ought to produce a level of accuracy that isn't a million miles away from that of a full-scale YouGov poll.
That said, there is one significant difference between the YouGov subsample average and these Panelbase numbers, which is that Labour's vote is considerably higher with Panelbase. It's not doing them much good in terms of seats, though, because six of the seven seats they're defending are highly vulnerable to a relatively modest swing to the SNP.
I'm not particularly concerned that the SNP are 'only' in the high 30s, because Panelbase have in recent years tended to report lower SNP figures than other firms. This is actually the SNP's best showing in any Panelbase poll since 2017.
The Liberal Democrats will be (or certainly ought to be) mildly disappointed with these numbers, because their vote has remained static since the last comparable poll in June - suggesting there has been no Swinson Bounce at all as of yet.
(Since writing the above paragraph, I've doublechecked and it turns out that the June 2016 poll was actually commissioned by the Sunday Times anyway! They've obviously forgotten about that one.)
I don't pay the Murdoch Levy and can therefore only see the first few paragraphs of the Sunday Times piece, but it appears there was also a supplementary question that invited respondents to make a straight choice between Scotland staying as part of the UK after Brexit, and independence within the EU. I haven't found the exact figures yet, but on that question there is majority support for independence within the EU. That'll be food for thought for the minority within the SNP who believe that the road to a Yes win involves watering down the party's outright Remain stance and embracing the EFTA option.
UPDATE: It looks like the forced choice question asked whether independence-in-Europe or precious-union-in-Brexit would be better for Scotland economically, which perhaps puts a slightly different complexion on it. But 45% of respondents chose independence-in-Europe and only 35% chose precious-union-in-Brexit, which with Don't Knows excluded must be roughly a 56% to 44% split. That's very much "decisive" in BBC terms.
Here are the Westminster voting intention numbers from the poll:
SNP 39% (+1)
Conservatives 21% (+3)
Labour 20% (+3)
Liberal Democrats 13% (n/c)
Brexit Party 5% (-4)
Greens 2% (n/c)
Seats projection: SNP 48, Conservatives 5, Liberal Democrats 5, Labour 1
Do those seat numbers look oddly familiar? That'll be because they're identical to the projection from the average of YouGov subsamples that I published the other day - which is really odd given that those subsamples are "piddly" and "meaningless" (ahem). But is this surprising? Not at all. As I've patiently pointed out about 7548 times over the last few years (and I can't force Somerset-based scribes to take this on board, but it is actually true), YouGov subsamples are different from those of other firms, because they're correctly structured and weighted. When there's a long gap between full-scale Scottish polls, as we've just had, the next-best way to get a sense of the state of play is to average several recent YouGov subsamples, which ought to produce a level of accuracy that isn't a million miles away from that of a full-scale YouGov poll.
That said, there is one significant difference between the YouGov subsample average and these Panelbase numbers, which is that Labour's vote is considerably higher with Panelbase. It's not doing them much good in terms of seats, though, because six of the seven seats they're defending are highly vulnerable to a relatively modest swing to the SNP.
I'm not particularly concerned that the SNP are 'only' in the high 30s, because Panelbase have in recent years tended to report lower SNP figures than other firms. This is actually the SNP's best showing in any Panelbase poll since 2017.
The Liberal Democrats will be (or certainly ought to be) mildly disappointed with these numbers, because their vote has remained static since the last comparable poll in June - suggesting there has been no Swinson Bounce at all as of yet.
Will this be the day we look back upon as being the turning point?
ReplyDeleteAlex Birnie
To the question "What would leave Scotland better off economically?"
ReplyDelete45% said as an independent country in the EU outside the UK
35% said in the UK outside the EU
20% DK
I believe that once again the did not include 16 & 17 year olds which of course does not make a huge difference but with rounding could bring it up to 51%.
That result is what stands out and should worry the unionists.
DeleteDon't tell them and let them be happy in their wee bubble, believing they are invincible.
DeleteGreat news suggesting that the recent introspection, petulance and foot stamping in certain quarters has failed to turn voters off independence. Maybe they'll have to adopt new tactics to derail independence.
ReplyDeleteSo it's official now; Scots support independence (polling average), and that's before the effect of the UK leaving the EU kicks in.
ReplyDeleteN. Irish support reunification too.
Meanwhile...
https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/top-stories/kantar-poll-on-eu-citizens-and-extending-article-50-1-6311465
Majority of EU citizens polled don't want to extend Article 50
While it's perfectly acceptable for the SNP/Greens to try and stop Scotland leaving the EU by scuppering brexit (in the fact of an Article 50 refusal), the English Remain parties should remember there are others in the equation.
You can understand this.
DeleteCenterpiece of the queen's speech will be that England doesn't want European people coming to freely live/work there. At best these will be merely 'tolerated' if some cash can be squeezed out of them for the benefit of English people.
This is great news and we will probably see a concerted propaganda effort in response.
ReplyDeleteThe BBC will be hiring someone to do a WW2 documentary as we speak!
Just one question James; we see SNP up 1%, Tories up 3%, Labour up 3%, in the Westminster voting intentions, but only the Brexit party are showing a drop of 4%, where is the other + 3% coming from? Has the whole mess that the UK is in politically, galvanized the voting public?
Also, can it be that the Brexit party has actually lost about 6%, with these voters have split between Labour and the Tories. This would probably be because they are convinced that Brexit will 'get done' by Boris, so are now concentrating on voting for anyone who they hope will stop the SNP?
Does Wee Wully Rennie need to be dusting off his Unionist credentials to show the Brit-Natz that he is the man for the job when it comes to saving the 'Union of Equals' (stop laughing at the back) ?
"where is the other + 3% coming from?"
DeleteIt doesn't necessarily need to be coming from anywhere - some if it could just be the effect of rounding. But I haven't seen the exhaustive figures yet.
Jo Swinson in an interview with Sophy Rudge practically admit live on TV that she's undemocratic "If that's what it takes"
ReplyDeleteThis poll again highlights why SNP/Green intention for Westminster is not and never will be proportional to Yes intention.
ReplyDeleteThere will only be the loosest of correlations because it's not Scotland'd parliament, but at best the UK's and, as everyone really knows, England's. So how Scots vote here is not really about what they want for Scotland, but an attempt to influence what England does. This may involve not bothering at all, as happened in 2017 with many Yes voters after they were treated like lepers post 2015.
Oh, and it's why Yes is likely higher than the numbers in hand. As we all know, and pollsters openly concluded ahead of 2014, weighting to Westminster intention in Scotland is flawed for this reason. There is far too much tactical voting and/or England influencing attempts which lead to false recall. People say they support indy/SNP (and vote this way for Holyrood), when in fact they voted Corbyn 2017 for example. That, or as per 2017, you have lots of SNP supporters saying they voted (supported) SNP when in fact they didn't turn out at all as it was all about England.
DeleteMORI is not affected by this problem, hence it gets Yes higher. it only weights by standard demographics, not past vote, which is subject to error, like it or not.
Someone PM'd me this on Messenger
ReplyDelete"I find this very suspicious that all these polls are always too close to call . People in Northern Ireland support Irish unification at 51% a new poll finds. Also a recent poll had stated that 51% now supported Scottish independence. There is reason why these polls are too close too call . If say the polls stated support was 55% for both Irish Unification and Scottish independence leading up to a the vote on both these issues and a few days prior to casting one’s vote there was a huge vote swing against both unification and independence this would draw suspicion by the voters of it being rigged a corrupt vote result. In the future we will never see a poll that says over 52% for Scottish independence .Keep the percentage to close to call then the result will be believed that there was no outside government interference and a that there had been a democratic electoral process that had taken place and witnessed by electoral observers."
"That'll be food for thought for the minority within the SNP who believe that the road to a Yes win involves watering down the party's outright Remain stance and embracing the EFTA option."
ReplyDeleteThe EU commission have publicly stated that we can't stay in the EU and will have to apply for entry. Hence as a matter of fact and strategy all the SNP can promise now is single market membership and a future referendum on EU membership.
It makes good tactical sense to keep it to single market for an Indyref as it sidesteps stupid FUD questions on Schengen, euro, deficits etc.
It also helps with those Yes/leave voters.
I do have a problem with this.
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/WingsScotland/status/1183305477398159360
Sturgeon sent a letter to the previous UK government asking to begin the Section 30 process. This was a Tory majority government. It subsequently collapsed by voting itself out of office in a confidence motion, triggering a general election. It was a nice way to sidestep the Section 30, amongst other things.
A completely new government was then formed; a Tory + British terrorist DUP coalition. The UK parliament was completely refreshed at the same time. Every single seat contested.
The Scottish parliament has not requested a Section 30 of this new government/parliament. Not that I'm aware of.
While pedantic, this is an important distinction. A Section 30 needs to be voted through the HoC. It's not really a matter for the PM, but for the HoC. The PM could back it to the hilt, but fail to pass it due to HoC opposition. The HoC could also force it through against the wishes of the PM, just as the Benn Act has been forced through over the head of Johnson.
To be honest, it's not right that it requires any sort of approval. Not in the sense that this should be refused. If the HoC must vote, this should be an automatic yes if the SP has voted it through. Only the courts should be deciding that it's free and fair if needed. But the above is correct as things stand.
Anyway, I disagree with Wings and many others on this, Wings fanboy that I am.
The SNP have played the 'England refusing a Section 30' card well. They have really milked it. However, it's not actually happened as far as I can see.
The Treaty of the Union of the Scottish and English Parliaments is still operational. This was upheld by the Supreeme Court when it deemed the PM was not sovereign. It must therefore deem that the Scottish people are sovereign by law.
DeleteSee above, it has to grant a section 30 order, otherwise it is breaking the Treaty, makeing Scotland independent.
DeleteOn the subject of acceding to the EU or our continuing membership of it, our position should be that we never voted to leave, never wanted to leave, and our membership should therefore be seen as continuing uninterrupted.
ReplyDeleteRegardless of whether that argument holds water legally, politically we must bang on about it loud and long and constantly, because both public and governmental opinion throughout Europe is already in our favour and because when there's a will, there's a way.The more the Westminster regime pis*ses the Europeans off, the better their opinion of our Government's sane and rational behaviour on the European and international scenes, and our committed Europeanism.
As the Scottish legislature and executive branch will deliberately not pass or make any legislation or regulations that conflict with either the European acquis or EU legislation and regulations passed during any interim period, and will continue to legislate as an EU member State would in order to keep ourselves up to date with applicable EU legislation (statements of intent and memoranda of understanding come immediately to mind), there can be no obstacle to our membership on those grounds. How the practicalities are organised is irrelevant in that regard.
The most important thing, in my view, is that Scotland should take its seat within the EU at the highest levels immediately on independence, and the number of our MEPs should be agreed and elected so that they can take their seats in the European Parliament as soon as possible. All our representatives should preferably have all voting rights from the outset, but should at least be able to be present as observers, while the ongoing and necessary legal, administrative and technical démarches (technical diplomatic term for procedures / steps / approaches) are carried out and completed.
The reason for wanting those seats as soon as practically possible is that Scotland should immediately have a voice, an influential voice, in how the EU deals with England. This could hardly be of greater importance for us. We can usefully work with the Irish to form a common front, for reasons that are obvious. The EU already backs Ireland to the hilt - and we will both want and need that too.
We should be able to expect that work is ongoing to review all the international treaties, conventions and other applicable legal instruments which are binding on Scotland, and update and amend them to reflect our altered status as an independent State. We must also have draft treaty / treaties with England ready and waiting to be negotiated on immediately we vote for independence. It will be greatly to our advantage to have that work done in advance, because if we wait for Westminster to do it we could wait for ever, and it can be guaranteed that anything Westminster regimes put on the table will be to England's advantage and not ours: the notion of equal partnership is anathema to Them, because of that damned exceptionalism of the British / English Establishment.
There's a great deal of preparatory work to be done before we regain our independence; we should and must not wait until after. The sooner begun, the sooner finished - and we want to have our independence become a reality as soon as possible after we regain it theoretically, which will be the moment a victory for Yes becomes official.
We must not let any Westminster regime stand in our way. We must not agree to let Them stop us or delay us, because we must insist on our equal status as a sovereign State right from the start. If we do not insist on it, Westminster will continue to behave as if we were a colony or a province, and it will be the worse for us, as we will no longer have any MPs at all at Westminster to even speak on our behalf before being shouted down and ignored.
And it is all entirely pointless as mad mental nicky insists on giving the english a veto over Scotland's democratic right to decide our future.
ReplyDeleteWhy is she the only one who insists on the S30 order being necessary to stage a legitimate referendum?
Why is Scotland the only country on Earth which isn't covered by the UN charter?
Why are we not allowed to dissolve our abusive marriage?
Why is the current FM the biggest obstacle to independence?
Salmond was committed to holding a referendum without asking for one. Cameron taunted Salmond to call a referendum and never ever mentioned this mysterious S30 order. Nobody did, because everyone and their dead pig's head knows that Scotland can have a vote on any subject and as oftern as we like and there's nothing they can do apart from send in the tanks.
Where does the veto come from?
DeleteYou say yourself that everyone and their dead pig's head knows that Scotland can have a vote on any subject and as often as it wants.
And a Section 30 hasn't been asked for. Not yet. Instead, the Scottish government have managed to get the electorate to believe the UK government is refusing one, or will refuse one, even though there's no evidence that's realistically possible, just as Cameron found. Seems to me they are milking this angle for votes quite successfully. It's got Scots extremely angry at the UK government and, and is making people back independence. It can be milked right up until a few weeks before it's actually asked for.
If the UK government wants to refuse a section 30, it will need to be prepared to explain to the Court of Session why it thinks English MPs/voters should be deciding such things, not Scots. They'd rather obviously loose for the reasons you are pointing out. You can't say time and again that Scotland is a free and willing partner in the UK - even confirm that by holding an iref - and expect the court not to agree with that on sifting through the evidence. If the UK wanted to stop independence legally, it should have said from the start Scots could never have indy. It's too late now.
You say yourself that everyone and their dead pig's head knows that Scotland can have a vote on any subject and as often as it wants
DeleteExcellent news, so Scotland is a free and willing partner in the UK then, as you can say it can have a referendum whenever it likes.
If a formal section 30 request is not refused, then it would be as Anon says. However, the current UK government is saying they would refuse one, and who am I to disagree with such a yes vote generator.
DeleteI will always be grateful to Stu Campbell for teaching us how to spot bullshit, lies and twisting facts to suit a particular narrative.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with learning how to do these things, is that you can't unlearn them, even if the bullshit, lies and twisting facts are being perpetrated by one of your (erstwhile) heroes.
"Wings over Scotland" has just published the last question in the poll it recently commissioned, and the bullshit is in full flow.
The title of this poll might as well be "Trashing the SNP, in preparation for the formation of the shiny new (completely different from RISE) political party". Yes, I know, it's a shite title, but I'm not the wordsmith that the Rev is.
He has used his considerable skills and journalistic talents to transform himself from the sharpest anti-unionist-crap weapon in the yes movement, into a fourth rate politician, using the dark arts to "do down" the sharpest political weapon that the yes movement have - the SNP.
I'm no SNP "sheep". I joined the SNP as part of the 90,000 strong army of disgruntled ex-labour supporters, who joined the SNP after the indy referendum, because we recognised that our only chance of living in a social democracy, was for Scotland to be independent.
For me, the SNP is merely a bus, the vehicle that is going to carry us to the place we want to be an independent Scotland. I will defend the bus against vandals trying to disable it, whether those vandals are the Stephen Daisleys of the unionist side, attacking it with whatever tools they have, and against anyone else, even those who are using Daisley-style misinformation to damage the bus.
Rev Stu Campbell is now, in my mind, the Stephen Daisley of the yes world. I'm not going to concern myself as to what his motivations are for becoming what he has become - a bloody menace - I'm just going to treat him in the same way as I treated the RISE folk and the Solidarity folk, who tried to pull off the SNP-vote-stealing that Stu is about to embark on.
It's one thing to criticise some of the SNP's policies and tactics (we're Scottish - that's what Scots do), but it is a completely different thing when you do it as part of an agenda that involves you trying to plonk your fat arse into a seat in Holyrood as Stu Campbell appears to be trying to do.
Hell mend him. He's become as bad as those he has been deriding for the last few years.
Alex Birnie
ReplyDelete''Mad mental nicky'' gives you away. Visiting from Wings? Another who doesn't actually want to see Scotland become independent.
More likely visiting from poor Pamela Nash's Scotland in Union outfit or Vodka Jill's Scotland's Nutters and the Green Ink Gang pretending to be from Wings.
Delete''I will always be grateful to Stu Campbell for teaching us how to spot bullshit, lies and twisting facts to suit a particular narrative.''
ReplyDeleteI'm grateful too. It's helped me to spot Campbell's bullshit, lies and twisting of facts all being used in an attempt to destroy our chances of getting Independence.
''He has used his considerable skills and journalistic talents to .. "do down" the sharpest political weapon that the yes movement have - the SNP. ''
He's probably just taking advice from his Unionist bosses now.
No, I don't believe that Stu is a unionist. It's more complicated than that. I think he started to believe his own publicity, and he thinks he's smarter than the average bear.
DeleteI was a bit miffed that he used contributors' donations to fund his silly fight with Dugdale. Is Stu's personal reputation REALLY more important than funding more Wee Blue (or Black) books? Or conducting polls? Well, obviously - meaningful, relevant polls, rather than steaming pile of shit that this latest one is.
Would the yes movement be set back politically, if Stu had just shrugged off Kezia Dugdale's slander?
I think Stu's narcissism (probably latent for years) has overcome his good sense I'm sure he sincerely believes that he's the shining white knight riding into the battleground to save the day from the incompetent leadership of the SNP.
It's a truly sad spectacle, seeing him become such a caricature. Has he always been like this? - and we've just ignored his wilder foibles, like this trans stuff, his anti-Rangers rhetoric, and his savaging of Liverpool fans? Were the signs of his iunstable nature always there, but we turned a blind eye, because he WAS such an effective tool?
Alex Birnie
Narcissism is pretty common amongst journalists, and unfortunately Mr. Campbell is not immune. I could name quite a number of journalists who are or were fellow sufferers. Yes, I think the signs were always there but the then quality of his journalism caused people to ignore it.
DeleteIf I wanted to destroy support for independence what better way to do it than to nobble someone with massive support within the independence movement (not for much longer though).
DeleteIf I wanted to severely damage the SNP's prospects of forming another government, I can't think of a better way of doing it, than what Stu Campbell is trying to do.
DeleteAfter asking the bullshit question he asked, none of us (including Stu) are any the wiser as to the likelihood of SNP voters switching to a putative Wings party, although the signs aren't promising. It is a testament to the political savvy of the SNP voters that he polled, that, (contrary to the spin Stu has put on the results), so FEW replied "Definitely yes" to such a leading question, and that so MANY answered "Definitely no". Stu must be secretly gutted.
Unless Stu asks a properly weighted question, we will be in the exact same position as we were when the RISE folk were trying the same stunt in 2016, that Stunisvtrying to pull off in 2021, except, that because of the size of Wings footprint, he is far more likely to trample into the grey area of low, single digit percentages of votes, where actual damage could be don to the SNP's prospects of winning regional seats.
The figures bandied about by his mate in that ludicrous "explanation" a week or so ago, are laughable, but Stu needs to get serious about asking a proper question.
If I thought that me trying to "nobbling Stu" would damage the independence campaign, the I would be guilty of as much hubris as him, (but I would keep my trap shut). I'm just a punter, expressing an opinion on here, (thanks for your forbearance James), because the snowflake that is Stu Campbell has blocked me from posting on his site. His ego is so fragile, that a punter like me, expressing views which I KNOW are shared by many, has to be blocked. Robust debate? Not really....
Alex Birnie
It is smoke and mirrors. FM has to keep up the section 30 order stance now since the precedent has been set. What is being overlooked is the new law currently going through Holyrood. If the Scot gov call a referendum on a reserved matter (like the constitution) Westminster can automatically refer this to the Supreme Court and have it heard under English Law. However the new law allows a Minister to call a referendum and any challenge to this has to start in the Scottish courts. This allows a defence under the Scots Law Claim of Rights, even on reserved matters. So once this new law is passed and the Section 30 request is refused it is easier for FM to proceed without it and have any referendum declared legal in Scots Law. All of this, including the current emphasis on a Section 30 order, is just so that we get international recognition of independence as being legally obtained from start to finish.
ReplyDeleteThat makes sense to me, Alan. I'm not a lawyer, and wiser heads might be able to debunk this, but it certainly sounds logical.....
DeleteAlex Birnie
With regard to the timing of the EUref...
ReplyDeleteThe mandate given by the electorate to the SNP + Greens was to hold one based on the UK leaving the EU. The UK has not left the EU. It hasn't signed a deal signing off a departure from the EU. It might yet not leave the EU at all. Ergo, there is not a specific mandate for an iref; not yet. The SNP didn't stand on a ticket for 'We'll hold an iref on leaving the UK if it looks like maybe the UK might leave the EU!'. They were pretty clear on a 'material change in circumstances', which hasn't as yet happened.
If a deal is signed off, the mandate kicks in. If we crash out, the mandate kicks in. Leaving will give the long sought for boost to Yes which guarantees a win and that will be that.
However, for the moment, it does all somewhat hinge on what happens in England.
Imagine they pushed ahead with iref 2, set the date for next month, then bojo lost a GE to a Lab-Lib coalition who proceeded to hold a new EUref which delivered a Remain.
DeleteWhat then? Cancel the iref? Hold it and maybe lose 49.9% Yes / 51.1% No due to brexit being cancelled? If either of these two happened, forget iref3 in the next parliament...
So we must wait to see what way England will jump.
What if the iref was won on a 'Vote Yes because of brexit', then brexit didn't happen? Unionists could argue Scots were sold a false premise...that they only voted Yes because they thought brexit was coming and it didn't happen. A new referendum would be needed?
DeleteNo, we need a conclusion to brexit, at least for any referendum based on the 2016 mandate realistically.
I have heard on here that on independence Scotland will still have to pay it's share of British debt ( 2 $ trillion pounds? 38% of GDP? ) . Why? Also, if it's staying as part of national Defense etc, and I assume that's why staying the firmer, why is that not played up bigger to throw in English faces. And why is pension payments not tied to that. I assume health and benefits of veterans and gov officials must be a huge number of pounds. Does Kenya still pay for this stuff? I don't think so. But you presumably are going to? Why is that not a positive ??
ReplyDeleteI read the WAS stuff earlier after being on here and I was so incensed at his misrepresentation that I was pushed to respond - but then I couldn't be bothered. Simple facts as mentioned by Mochachoca and the fact that we haven't left the EU yet for the SG mandate to start both ignored. I just hope he uses his own money to start his new party not the money from his fundraiser. To me it looks like the SNP have called it just about right so far.
ReplyDeleteIt looks good I hope it is and it gets better as we go along.
ReplyDeleteIndependence means the end to some people's lucrative revenue streams so given that some people aren't Angels for Independence for purely altruistic and patriotic reasons it also stands to reason that those people might be a little upset to lose their incomes and court expenses when the rest of us find out they're no different to any newspaper printing guff to sell their newspaper to however many gullible folk they can appeal to
ReplyDeleteThe internet might be a place for many ordinary people to sound off on but to others it's their living their rent their mortgage their very lifestyle and they'll say anything to protect that
As long as there are people who'll fall for it
Nigel Farage has made a whole career out of conning the electorate
Farage for all his Tory credentials is not an EU grovelling Jock. Who would have thought that the Jockos who have fought decades for Scottish independence would sell out their nation to EU rich elites. The taste of shite in their mouths must be appallinging.
DeleteI suggest Iral B toithoadte. Ris the one mu dentist uses.
DeleteScottish Nat sis are a teefless bunch. Orange floss for them.
Delete