Thursday, February 9, 2023

Fear grips Westminster as landmark Telegraph mega-poll shows pro-independence parties are on course to win AN OUTRIGHT MAJORITY OF THE POPULAR VOTE at a de facto referendum in 2024

You'll probably have seen by now that there's a headline-grabbing Britain-wide poll for the Daily Telegraph which projects that a general election now would result in a Labour government, with the SNP overtaking the Tories to become the Official Opposition, and with Stephen Flynn replacing Keir Starmer as Leader of the Opposition.  I initially thought the Scottish component of the projection must be fairly questionable due to being based on a tiny sample size, but in fact that's not the case - the GB-wide sample was an enormous 28,000, meaning that the Scottish subsample is roughly the same size as would generally be used for a full-scale Scottish poll.  Here are the percentage voting intentions...

Find Out Now poll for the Daily Telegraph (27th January - 5th February 2023)

GB-wide voting intentions for the next UK general election:

Labour 49%
Conservatives 21%
Liberal Democrats 10%
Greens 6%
Reform UK 6%
SNP 5%
Plaid Cymru 1%

Scottish voting intentions for the next UK general election:

SNP 48%
Labour 25%
Conservatives 12%
Liberal Democrats 7%
Greens 3%
Reform UK 3%

There's almost no chance in the real world that the SNP will become second party in the Commons.  That doesn't necessarily mean the poll is wrong, but it's a snapshot of opinion at a certain period of time, and the likelihood is that when a general election comes around the Tories will be able to shore up their support sufficiently to at least hold on to most of their heartland seats.  So in a way that means everyone is missing the point about this poll - what's interesting about it is not the projection of Flynn as Leader of the Opposition, but instead the fact that the SNP and Greens between them have 51% of the popular vote in Scotland.  Which means that if the SNP stick with the original plan of using the next Westminster election as a de facto independence referendum, an outright mandate for independence would, on these numbers, be won.

That said, given the unusual nature of the poll, and the relatively untested nature of Find Out Now as a pollster, it's hard to know how much credence to give to the numbers.  If they can be trusted, they certainly seem to suggest that the impact of the GRR controversy has been vastly overstated - either that, or the SNP's U-turns on trans prisoners have reversed the damage.  (The fieldwork for this poll was conducted after Nicola Sturgeon announced Isla Bryson would not be held at Cornton Vale.)

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19 comments:

  1. Fear grips Stewart McDonald MP?

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  2. Nicola will be shitting herself at the thought of having a democratic mandate for independence.

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  3. TRANSPHOBIATHON RIP

    Dedicated fans of the Reverend Stuart Campbell's unprecedented "Transphobiathon" of *****twenty-five***** consecutive Wings posts about trans people will be devastated to learn that it came to an end with a whimper today when Campbell wrote a short post about an unconnected subject. Its place in history was, however, already assured.

    Thoughts and prayers with the Reverend who presumably wasn't quite feeling himself today.

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  4. ICYMI the whole world moved to Asset Backed Currency on 1st Feb 2023.
    https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WP/Issues/2023/01/27/Gold-as-International-Reserves-A-Barbarous-Relic-No-More-528089

    The QFS is now effectively live and Fiat Currency is back to its intrinsic value - ZERO.

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  5. "There's almost no chance in the real world that the SNP will become second party in the Commons."

    I agree that it seems unlikely(for one, Labour is so far behind in some of those Conservative heartlands that such a wipeout would almost certainly push the Lib Dems into second party status) but this is, what, the third time the possibility has been squirted out of a poll. At what point should the prospect of the UK Tories emulating Scottish Labour's 2015 wipeout be taken seriously?

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    1. I’d take it seriously if individual seat polling in Tory heartland constituencies showed them well behind first place. Anyone got Michael Ashcroft’s satellite phone number?

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    2. Aye, but good luck getting your hands on those.

      Here's something I tried - comparing the polling of Scotland in the leadup to UKGE2015 to the polls now. So we see that pollsters were predicting 46-54% for the SNP and 20-28% for Labour. Actual result: 50% SNP, 24% Lab.

      Well, the UK-wide polls are currently in the range of 46-50% Lab, 21-29% Con. Not quite there yet, but damned close.

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  6. Reform UK. Sorry James but excuse my laughter !

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  7. His Majesty’s Official Opposition? It’ll never happen of course. But what if …. ?
    The SNP received £1,178,000 Short money this financial year. The Labour Party received £6,055,000.
    Calm yersels Nicola and Peter, it disnae work that way.
    Even as the Official Opposition, the Short money allocated to the SNP would remain basically unchanged.
    The Leader of the Official Opposition would however receive £904,000. That would go some way to further camouflaging the haemorrhaging party membership subs..

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  8. Terry Callachan Dundee , you can rest assured that Westminster would never ever ever allow the Scottish National Party to be the official opposition in Westminster , they would simply not allow it to happen they would change the rules and be backed by the House of Lords , but that change of rules would in itself be something to behold , there would be no denying the hatred that place has of Scotland.

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  9. Whats the betting that by the end of the weekend Scottish Skier becomes an exert on public interest journalism and the law around it complete with a new family member who is also an expert in it....

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  10. Not a good week for Stewart McDonald, eh? Still he has his wee awards fae last year tae perk him up.

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  11. I think 'Fear' is rather optimistic - 'Now is not the time' is the Brit ripost. Maybe in a hung parliament but keeping in mind Sir Keith is a BritNat courting the tory vote. Maybe if 60% vote SNP but even then...

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  12. Whether folk like to admit it or not England is an incredibly racist country and the very idea of having a Scottish party of any description with the slightest glimmer of authority over the Yookay would drive England to total insanity, hence the reminder by the right wing media to the voters of England to vote Tory to prevent such a horrible thing ever happening to their Yookay

    Clickbait is a thing used by political parties as well as the media, so when you see a story that appears contrary to the norm it immediately starts the rush of click click click and those who placed the clickbait story just conducted the polling they required while very often amusing themselves over the resulting idiot journalists and bloggers who fall for it

    Now you see it, now it was never real to begin with

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