The way forward

Should we be bracing ourselves for the sequence of twenty-in-a-row Yes majority polls to be broken? Even just from a purely statistical point of view, it's very possible that could happen - the most recent polls from both YouGov and Survation had Yes on 51%, and the most recent from Panelbase had Yes on 52%. Due to the margin of error, sooner or later you're likely to end up dropping to 49% in at least one poll. And that's before we even consider recent events, which may have checked the momentum behind the Yes movement. Nobody is free of responsibility for that. It's all very well for the SNP leadership to lecture the rank-and-file as if they're unruly schoolchlidren, but the building and maintenance of unity is a two-way process, and yesterday's sacking of Joanna Cherry was a monumentally idiotic unforced error that the leadership have no-one to blame for but themselves. None of the excuses we've heard from anonymous sources are remotely convincing. Even if you're hellbent on punishing a hugely popular frontbencher for alleged 'disloyalty', there are ways of doing it with subtlety and nous. Instead of sacking her, you could move her to a less prominent portfolio, and if she refused to take it, you could present it as a resignation. Or you could offer her a meaningful role away from the frontbench. And what you most certainly wouldn't do is sack two other promiment people from the same wing of the party at exactly the same time as sacking her. What happened yesterday looks like petty factionalism because that's exactly what it is. 

However, we are where we are, and in a strange way the results of independence polls aren't actually the most important thing in the very short-term. So close to an election, we normally set the independence numbers to one side and concentrate almost exclusively on the party political voting intention numbers. It's odd that hasn't happened yet, and it may be because an SNP win and a pro-indy majority at Holyrood look like foregone conclusions. But we know from the 2016 campaign that such an impression can be horribly deceptive. The election has to be taken by the scruff of the neck and won, whether by the SNP alone, or by the SNP and the Greens in combination, or by a three-way combination of the SNP, the Greens, and a Party X involving Alex Salmond. I've no idea whether Mr Salmond is even thinking along those lines, and I know some people are claiming it's impossible anyway because he'd be timed out by the Electoral Commission - but there are always ways and means. He could, for example, join forces with one of the small pro-indy parties that are already registered with the Electoral Commission. If he doesn't take the plunge, though, we have to be realistic and accept that the SNP and Greens are the only game in town and are the only pro-indy parties capable of winning seats. I know that's a bitter pill to swallow for people furious with both party leaderships for their stance on the trans issue and reluctance on Plan B, but it really is true - if we care about independence, this is an absolutely critical election, and in the absence of a Salmond-led party we'll need to set aside all reservations and make an SNP/Green majority happen. And, more ideally, an outright SNP majority. 

Some people are in love with the idea of building up the ISP and winning list seats that way, but without big name backing that simply isn't a viable option. We'll doubtless hear the usual misguided arguments over the coming weeks about how SNP supporters should vote "tactically" on the list for the Greens, and those siren voices should be ignored. But at the end of the day, if you vote Green in the erroneous belief that you're doing so tactically, you're at least voting for a party that has a chance of picking up list seats. That will not be the case if you vote for the ISP or another fringe party.

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