Scot Goes Pop / Panelbase poll: By decisive margins, the Scottish public say the election result *does* give the SNP a mandate to hold an independence referendum, and that Brexit *is* a big enough change of circumstances to justify another indyref

I have two more results for you tonight from the Panelbase poll this blog commissioned with your help.  The first question is an extremely simple and obvious one that no-one seems to have asked before.  The UK government insist that the SNP's landslide win in the general election is neither here nor there, and that it's certainly not a mandate to hold a second independence referendum (even though a referendum this year was specifically promised in the SNP's manifesto).  But do the public agree with the UK government?  Let's find out...

In last month's general election, the SNP won 48 of the 59 Scottish seats in the House of Commons.  Do you believe this result gives the SNP a mandate from the Scottish people to hold a second independence referendum?

Yes 48%
No 42%

With Don't Knows excluded, that works out as roughly 53% who say there is a mandate for an indyref, and 47% who say there is not.  In BBC lingo, that's a decisive margin, although the main reason it's a relatively close result is the near-unanimity of opinion among Conservative voters.  No fewer than 95% of respondents who voted Tory in December deny that the SNP have a mandate, which I must say is rather ironic given that they're the ones who voted for a party that claimed the holding of an indyref was on the ballot paper.  It takes a fair bit of cognitive dissonance to go down that road and then tell yourself that the very clear outcome of the election is irrelevant, but that's what seems to have happened.

There's more of a mixture of views among the supporters of other unionist parties, though - 24% of Liberal Democrat voters accept the SNP's mandate, and so do a very healthy 39% of Labour voters.  (But remember that over one-third of Labour-voting respondents support independence anyway.)

The next question I decided to ask was another very obvious one.  I'm sure something similar must have been asked in previous polls, but maybe not in quite these precise terms.

When Scotland voted against independence in the 2014 referendum, it was not known that Britain would leave the EU a few years later.  Do you think Brexit is a big enough change of circumstances to justify holding a second independence referendum?

Yes 52%
No 41%

If Don't Knows are excluded, approximately 56% of those who expressed a view think that Brexit justifies another indyref, and 44% disagree.  I must admit I was quite surprised by the size of that majority, and it suggests to me that a significant minority of anti-independence voters must understand and agree with the argument that the No vote in 2014 was at least partly won on a false prospectus, ie. that it would preserve the EU citizenship of Scottish residents.  What's the fairest thing to do in those circumstances?  The blindingly obvious answer is "hold a re-run".

Incidentally, no single group of respondents is particularly responsible for the bigger majority on the second question - there's just a smidgeon more support in lots of different places.  Even Tory voters were slightly more likely to answer Yes to the second question - although admittedly the difference is merely between 2% on the first question and 4% on the second!

*  *  *

There are more questions from the poll still to be released, and in my opinion the most significant result of all is still to come.  If you'd like to be the first to know when the remaining results are published, you can follow me on Twitter HERE.