Westminster in crisis tonight as new Norstat poll shows support for independence has risen to around 50%

One of the minor wins for the unionist camp over the last couple of years is that they've somehow persuaded media organisations and some polling companies to revert to publishing independence poll numbers with Don't Knows left in.  That shouldn't be happening - the practice was completely abandoned in the run-up to the 2014 indyref, and for obvious reasons you would never see voting intention numbers for Holyrood or Westminster that don't exclude undecideds.  The purpose of the wheeze is presumably to give the false impression that support for independence is lower than it is - if you say, for example, that "Yes support is at 47%", most people will assume that means No support is at 53%, whereas 53% is in fact the combined figure for No and Don't Know.

In the case of the latest Norstat poll for the Sunday Times, the figures with Don't Knows stripped out haven't even been mentioned in the write-up at all, so all I can tell you is that a rough recalculation shows that the headline numbers must be either Yes 49%, No 51% or Yes 50%, No 50%, hence my use of the phrase "around 50%" in the title of this post.  It's extremely frustrating not to know for sure, but the fact that we don't can be assumed to be an intentional tactic.  The data tables will resolve the mystery in the fullness of time.

Should Scotland be an independent country?  (Norstat/Sunday Times, before exclusion of Don't Knows)

Yes 47% (+2)

No 48% (-1)

This is the first poll since Norstat took over Panelbase, so the percentage changes are measured from the last Panelbase poll.  If anything, Panelbase have tended to be one of the more No-friendly firms in recent years, which makes Yes practically drawing level all the more striking as a development.  From a personal point of view, given my history of commissioning polls from Panelbase for Scot Goes Pop, I'm sad to see that the Panelbase branding seems to have been dropped for this poll, and I'll be interested to discover whether the change is purely presentational or goes deeper than that.

While this is an unalloyed good news poll for the Yes movement, pretty much the opposite must be said for the SNP, who in Westminster terms have suffered their worst showing in a Panelbase/Norstat poll for many years.

Scottish voting intentions for the next UK general election:

Labour 36%

SNP 33%

Conservatives 16%

Liberal Democrats 7%

Seats projection (with changes from 2019 general election): Labour 28 (+27), SNP 18 (-30), Conservatives 6 (-), Liberal Democrats 5 (+1)

Paradoxically, there's some comfort to be drawn from the fact that Humza Yousaf's net trust rating in the poll is -25, and Nicola Sturgeon's is almost as bad at -19, which would have been unthinkable until very recently.  That suggests there is a personal element to the SNP's current unpopularity, which at least in theory could be reversed with a change of leader.  Whereas Tory rebels look a bit odd plotting to bring down Rishi Sunak when there is no obvious election-winning replacement waiting in the wings, the SNP are fortunate enough to have a 'queen over the water' figure in the shape of Kate Forbes, who we know is more highly regarded with the public than Yousaf.

Scottish Parliament constituency ballot:

SNP 36% (+1)

Labour 31% (-)

Conservatives 16% (-)

Liberal Democrats 7% (-)

Greens 5% (-2)

Scottish Parliament regional list ballot:

SNP 30% (+1)

Labour 29% (-1)

Conservatives 19% (+1)

Greens 9% (-3)

Liberal Democrats 7% (-1)

Seats projection (with changes from 2021 election): SNP 47 (-17), Labour 40 (+18), Conservatives 24 (-7), Greens 10 (+2), Liberal Democrats 8 (+4)

The Sunday Times piece claims this projection would almost certainly result in a Labour-led government with Anas Sarwar as First Minister, even though the SNP would remain the largest party.  Although that's certainly possible, I'm not so sure.  It's one thing Labour governing from second place in local councils thanks to informal deals with the Tories, but at Holyrood level there would be a much stronger spotlight on what they were doing.  The deal with the Tories wouldn't be deniable because the public would require a comprehensible explanation for why the SNP, who "won" the election, were being frozen out of power, while Labour, who "lost" the election, were lording it as if they had won.  And a deal with the Tories which is not deniable is a massive problem for Labour, particularly with a view to future Westminster elections.  They may decide it's simply more trouble than it's worth.

Scot Goes Pop can only continue with your help: In order to commission future Scot Goes Pop polls, but also just to keep the blog going, I am reliant on generous donations from readers.  The simplest and quickest way to make a donation is via direct Paypal payment. Depending on the option you select from the menu, this can eliminate all fees, and the payment usually comes through instantly. My Paypal email address is:

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Sensation as new Find Out Now poll shows clear majority of Scottish public want independence

Thank you to a commenter on the previous thread for alerting me to the fact that The National are reporting a new Find Out Now poll, commissioned by the Alba Party, which shows a Yes lead of four points. 

Should Scotland be an independent country?  (Find Out Now / Alba Party, 11th-24th January 2024)

Yes 52%

No 48%

In spite of the cynicism that greets any Find Out Now poll commissioned by a pro-independence client, the reality is that the results have to be regarded as credible - Find Out Now are affiliated to the British Polling Council and I know from direct personal experience that they take the BPC's rules and guidelines extremely seriously.  They have previously been commissioned to conduct an independence poll by a unionist newspaper, namely the Daily Express, and as with the subsequent polls for pro-independence clients, that one showed a Yes lead.  So perhaps the cynicism should really be directed at the fact that the Express didn't use them again after getting the "wrong" results (although no less a unionist figure than Blair McDougall did give them the seal of approval by commissioning a poll from them last year).

Nevertheless, the information about the new poll is limited at this stage - there's nothing yet on Find Out Now's website or Twitter account or even on Alba's own news page.  So I'll just be a tad cautious until I'm able to doublecheck that the standard independence question was asked (I expect it was, though) and also that the numbers in the data tables tally up with what we're seeing today.  There was a strange discrepancy between the data tables in the last Find Out Now poll and what had been published several days earlier by the client (Independent Voices) - there may well have been an innocent explanation for that, but hopefully this time the Yes lead will prove to be beyond dispute.

*  *  *

I am standing tomorrow (Saturday) as a candidate for the Alba Party's Finance & Audit Committee, Disciplinary Committee, Appeals Committee, Conferences Committee and Constitutional Review Group.  If you're a National Council delegate I'd be grateful if you'd consider me (James Kelly) for a vote.  You can read more details HERE.

A reminder that you can vote James Kelly #1 for Alba's committees and Constitutional Review Group on Saturday at the party's National Council

So it's creeping up now - on Saturday, the Alba Party's next National Council will be taking place in Edinburgh, and among other things it will be electing members of four committees (Finance, Disciplinary, Appeals and Conferences) plus one special Constitutional Review Group.  I've put myself forward as a candidate for all five bodies, and yesterday I completed all the formalities, so I'll definitely be on the ballot form.  If you're a National Council delegate, I'd be grateful if you'd consider me for your votes - and remember it's a preferential voting system, so if you decide to give someone else your first preference vote, there's still the option of giving me your second, third or other lower preference vote, and I'd be equally grateful for that. And although only delegates can vote, there's nothing to stop rank-and-file members contacting their own LACU's delegates and expressing their views - the party belongs to the members, after all.

And that latter point is one of the reasons I'm so keen to be on the Constitutional Review Group.  The existence of that group will open up the possibility of future NEC elections being conducted by one member, one vote - something I will strongly support.  But I think that's the minimum that should happen - I also think the other committees up for election on Saturday should in future be elected by the whole party membership.  All members are subject to the party's disciplinary and appeals procedures, so there's an obvious stake for all members in being able to decide the composition of the Appeals and Disciplinary Committees.  National conference is the supreme decision-making body of the party and is open to all members (albeit on a first come, first served basis), so again, a Conferences Committee determining how conference is run is one that should be accountable to, and thus elected by, all members.

It's important not to fall into the trap of thinking that Alba is already very slightly more democratic than the SNP and is therefore democratic enough.  A new party should be aiming for something considerably more than a slight improvement on an older party with fossilised practices.  Remember it's less than a quarter of a century since the SNP last held a leadership election in which only delegates could vote, which seems incredible in retrospect.  Other internal election rules which survive in the SNP to the present day will seem outdated in due course, and actually Alba can help speed that process up by setting an example with an immaculate internal democracy.

There's also a practical reason why we need to outshine the SNP, though.  Imagine you're an independence supporter thinking of joining a political party, and you have to choose between a large party that runs the Scottish Government, that has third party status at Westminster and is at 35% in the opinion polls, and a small opposition party that only has a handful of elected representatives and is at 2% in the polls.  Why would you consider joining the smaller party?  One reason you might be tempted is if you can see the smaller party is the far more democratic of the two and you can be confident your voice will count for something.

Although I've focussed on the constitutional reform issues in the above paragraphs, I'm standing across the board for the various committees and I'm very keen to serve in any capacity.  I've been an elected member of the Appeals Committee for the last year, and before that I was on the Finance & Audit Committee in 2021-22 as an NEC nominee.  If I'm elected to any of the committees you can be sure of my integrity, my unshakeable commitment to independence, my belief in fairness and transparency, and my impatience with any form of cliquishness.

A reminder also that after National Council is over on Saturday, the same venue will host a conference on the way forward for Yes, and that event will be open to both rank-and-file Alba members and the wider public.

New Britain-wide YouGov poll offers some respite for the SNP

In the absence of more frequent Scottish polls (which I'm doing my level best to put right - fundraiser HERE!), the best available straw in the wind about what is going on with public opinion in election year comes from the Scottish subsamples in GB-wide YouGov polls - unlike most other firms, YouGov seem to structure and weight their subsamples correctly, although the margin of error is still huge due to the low sample size.  In spite of continuing to show a massive Britain-wide lead for Labour, the new poll - perhaps surprisingly - suggests the SNP may have made a small recovery.

GB-wide voting intentions (YouGov, 23rd-24th January 2024):

Labour 47% (-)

Conservatives 20% (-)

Reform UK 13% (+1)

Liberal Democrats 8% (-)

Greens 6% (-1)

SNP 4% (+1)

Plaid Cymru 1% (-)

Scottish subsample: SNP 37%, Labour 29%, Conservatives 16%, Liberal Democrats 6%, Reform UK 6%, Greens 3%

The reality of normal sampling variation means that Labour being a few points ahead in one subsample and the SNP being a few points ahead in the next subsample is perfectly consistent with a no change position, and the two parties remaining very closely matched.  But even that would be encouraging in one sense, because it would suggest Labour are not pulling away relentlessly.

Seat projections based on an individual subsample are a bit of a dubious exercise, but for what it's worth, it works out as SNP 36 (-12), Labour 13 (+12), Conservatives 5 (-1), Liberal Democrats 3 (-1).  That's pretty much the exact reverse of the projection from the previous subsample, illustrating how relatively small changes in the popular vote can be magnified by first-past-the-post and produce dramatic consequences in terms of seats.

The other big story of this poll is the astoundingly low seven-point gap (at GB level) between the Tories in second place and Reform UK in third.  That raises the intriguing question of whether Nigel Farage returning as Reform UK leader would be enough to see the Tories plummet to third in the polls.  

Before we finish, a reminder that the Scot Goes Pop opinion poll fundraiser urgently needs a boost - let's not leave it in limbo for months.  It's important that not all Scottish opinion polling is commissioned by anti-independence clients - we need to make sure that occasionally questions are asked that Yes supporters want asked.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE.

However if you have a Paypal account the best way to donate is via direct Paypal payment, because that can totally eliminate fees depending on which option you select, and payment usually comes through instantly.  My Paypal email address is:

jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

Could the SNP get some mileage out of the Flynn Factor?

As regular readers know, I think the SNP are approaching the coming general election in a completely hopeless way, with a pitch that amounts to a very unspecific "make Scotland's voice heard" which can't really hope to compete - either in terms of clarity or inspiration - with Labour's "vote for us on Thursday, get the Tories out by Friday". Really the SNP's best chance is to have a radical rethink of strategy and to galvanise pro-independence voters by actually giving them independence to vote for. Nevertheless, as you'll have seen I've still been trying to be constructive by suggesting ways the SNP could sharpen up their messaging if they insist on sticking with the much harder course.

Labour and the Tories are of course doing what they always do by feigning offence at the idea that people need to vote SNP for there to be a strong Scottish voice at Westminster - they say that Labour and Tory MPs would also be Scottish voices and would also be heard loudly.  One potentially effective way the SNP could challenge that notion is by pointing to Stephen Flynn's role at Prime Minister's Questions.  It's easy to be cynical and think that nobody watches PMQs, and it's true that the weekly event has a very small live audience, but it has a much wider reach through clips shown on news programmes and so on.  Most voters will thus be aware that the SNP in the shape of Flynn gets a regular opportunity to challenge and question Rishi Sunak.  They may also be rather impressed by the way Flynn conducts himself - not least yesterday, when he demanded that Sunak state clearly that what was seen in the ITV News footage of a Gazan civilian being murdered by the IDF constituted a war crime.  (A well-known interviewer, I think it might have been David Frost, once said that you can't force someone to answer a question they don't want to answer, but what you can do is use your follow-up to make sure viewers notice the question hasn't been answered and then make them wonder why, and Flynn very much followed that advice yesterday.)

Whether Labour and the Tories like it or not, Flynn's role does allow a Scottish voice to be heard at Westminster, and that role will only continue if the SNP do well enough at the general election - specifically if they hold onto third place by winning more seats than the Liberal Democrats do across the UK, which at the very least is likely to require that they remain the majority party in Scotland.  If Labour take over that majority status, there will be no equivalent role for a Scottish Labour MP at PMQs, and it's important that voters understand that.  Questions like the one yesterday about Gaza will simply go unasked in future.  The reality is that the Scottish Labour establishment wouldn't want Keir Starmer as PM being bothered with awkward questions about Israeli war crimes, so even if they had that opportunity they wouldn't take it.

So there we have a fairly clear-cut example of a Scottish voice being heard at Westminster, on subjects the Scottish people want raised, and in a way that does depend on SNP votes and seats.  The SNP possibly could get some mileage out of a sort of showreel of Flynn's "greatest hits", asking voters "do you really want to lose this?"

On a more negative note about Flynn, it's well known that he was one of the voices foolishly calling for independence to be sidelined in the SNP's election plans, so they could concentrate their campaigning on bread and butter issues.  In his latest interview for Representing Border he specified five issues that he thinks the general election will be fought on - 

* The cost of living crisis

* The economy

* Energy policy

* The constitution

* Migration

With the exception of "the constitution", which he probably just threw in tokenistically, how does he think any of those will work in the SNP's favour? Labour's mantra will be that if you want to do something about the economy or the cost of living crisis or whatever, you need a new government, which the SNP can't offer. 

What the SNP could be offering, though, is the radical change of independence, and that's what they'll need to do to get a hearing from voters.  But will that penny drop in time?  Ah hae ma doots.

Before we finish, a reminder that the Scot Goes Pop opinion poll fundraiser urgently needs a boost - let's not leave it in limbo for months.  It's important that not all Scottish opinion polling is commissioned by anti-independence clients - we need to make sure that occasionally questions are asked that Yes supporters want asked.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE.

However if you have a Paypal account the best way to donate is via direct Paypal payment, because that can totally eliminate fees depending on which option you select, and payment usually comes through instantly.  My Paypal email address is:

jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

Yousaf is odds-on to be gone within a year - but who might replace him?

I saw a screenshot of a newspaper article the other day - I can't find it now, but I think it might have been in the Press & Journal or something like that, and it suggested that Humza Yousaf is odds-on with a bookies' firm to be replaced as First Minister before the end of this calendar year, presumably on the assumption that the SNP will suffer losses at the general election and Yousaf will have to pay the penalty.  This prompted me to look up the odds for who might succeed him, but to my surprise I couldn't find any on the leading betting sites I initially checked.  That in itself should perhaps worry the SNP, because it might suggest that political observers south of the border are already semi-consciously "moving on" from the era of the SNP as the third party at Westminster.  If so, that could have more important consequences such as a downgrade in the status given to the SNP in the TV leaders' debates and so on.  They've got to somehow keep themselves looking as relevant as possible - frankly, junking the de facto referendum plan was one of the stupidest decisions they've ever made and the best thing they could do would be to simply reverse it.

Anyway, I eventually managed to find some SNP leadership odds on the website of McBookie, the Scottish firm which had been quoted by the newspaper article...

Kate Forbes 5/2

Mairi McAllan 5/1

Mhairi Black 5/1

Angus Robertson 6/1

Neil Gray 10/1

Ben Macpherson 12/1

Shona Robison 16/1

Jenny Gilruth 25/1

Joanna Cherry 25/1

Alex Salmond 50/1

Alyn Smith 50/1

Ian Blackford 50/1

Stephen Flynn 100/1

Michael Stewart 500/1

The renowned letter-writing impartial Liberal Democrat election expert Mike Smithson of Stormfront Lite fame always used to say that the reason political betting can be more profitable than sports betting is that bookies feel obliged to offer markets on politics, but often quote somewhat naive odds due to their own lack of knowledge on the subject, which can mean opportunities for genuine value bets if you look carefully for the mistakes.  I'd suggest that may be the case here, although I don't want to be too confident in saying that in case I end up costing anyone money.  

But on the face of it, Kate Forbes looks like the obvious value bet.  She's rightly favourite but the odds are still quite generous - you'd win two-and-a-half times whatever you stake.  I'm not suggesting she should be odds-on, because you have to factor in the chance that she might not stand at all for family reasons, and also that the continuity faction will be determined to stop her.  However, she's positioned herself perfectly as the change option, which is likely to capture the zeitgeist if the leadership election occurs after a general election humbling for the SNP.  I also can't see the kind of monstering she suffered last spring having the same kind of effect a second time - everyone knows all about her religious and social views now, so that's all factored in.  I reckon her true odds should be somewhere between evens and 2/1, so 5/2 looks a little tempting.

Mhairi Black, on the other hand, should be nowhere near 5/1, so I wouldn't touch that with a bargepole.  If McBookie are assuming a greater than 50% chance of a vacancy immediately after the general election, how can Black even stand?  She won't have a seat in any parliament at that point.  Mairi McAllan's position as joint second favourite will also raise a few eyebrows - I would guess the idea is that the Sturgeonites will unite behind a single champion as they did with Yousaf and that McAllan currently looks like the most telegenic option on offer.  But she's still awfully young and inexperienced.  Would she even want that weight upon her shoulders at such an early stage in her career?  Would potential backers not look to a more seasoned figure instead, when it really came down to it?

Alex Salmond is at 50/1, and you might wonder if it's unprecedented for a member of one party to be listed as a leadership contender for another party.  But in fact on the Betfair exchange Nigel Farage is currently listed at similar odds to be the next leader of the Conservative party.

Before we finish, a reminder that the Scot Goes Pop opinion poll fundraiser urgently needs a boost - let's not leave it in limbo for months.  It's important that not all Scottish opinion polling is commissioned by anti-independence clients - we need to make sure that occasionally questions are asked that Yes supporters want asked.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE.

However if you have a Paypal account the best way to donate is via direct Paypal payment, because that can totally eliminate fees depending on which option you select, and payment usually comes through instantly.  My Paypal email address is:

jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

"Get your nukes OFF our shores!" - dramatic YouGov survey reveals huge gulf in public opinion about nuclear weapons between Scotland and the rest of the UK

Last night, YouGov revealed the results of a survey showing substantial support among the British population for the retention of the UK's nuclear weapons - 53% support, 31% oppose.  But what went unmentioned is the fact that the same survey also shows that the country which is actually forced to host the weapons, and within just a few miles of its largest city, takes completely the opposite view.

Among respondents in Scotland, and the usual caveats about subsamples apply here, just 35% support the retention of nuclear weapons, while 41% are opposed.  No fewer than 25% of Scottish voters are "strongly" opposed, which is a much higher figure than in any other part of the UK.  The next highest is London at 16%, and the lowest is the Midlands at just 11%.

The reverse is of course true among those who "strongly support" Britain's nukes - the 16% figure in Scotland is lower than anywhere else, with 22% in the Midlands and the North of England being the next lowest.

Perhaps the risk of hosting these inhuman weapons should be transferred to a region that would appreciate them more?

It's worth reminding you at this point that a Scot Goes Pop / Panelbase poll in April 2021 found by a margin of 47% to 33% that the Scottish public want the UK to join the treaty banning nuclear weapons and then to dismantle its own nukes.  By a margin of 42% to 24%, they also felt that the presence of nuclear weapons on the Clyde made them "less safe" rather than "more safe".

Before we finish, a reminder that the Scot Goes Pop opinion poll fundraiser urgently needs a boost - let's not leave it in limbo for months.  It's important that not all Scottish opinion polling is commissioned by anti-independence clients - we need to make sure that occasionally questions are asked that Yes supporters want asked.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE.

However if you have a Paypal account the best way to donate is via direct Paypal payment, because that can totally eliminate fees depending on which option you select, and payment usually comes through instantly.  My Paypal email address is:

jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

Making it make sense for Stephen Daisley

The man who described Israel's invasion, conquest and annexation of Arab-populated East Jerusalem in 1967 as "The Liberation" claims to think that something someone else has said may not entirely make sense - 

"‘Starmer doesn’t need Scottish seats to win the next election’ but SNP MPs will somehow have influence over him after the election, according to this SNP MSP.

Make it make sense."

I'm not sure if that's a Dugdale tribute tweet or if Dugdale's tweet was itself a copy of others (possibly the latter given that she's not always the most original of thinkers), but in fact Daisley is paraphrasing the SNP MSP somewhat misleadingly.  Kaukab Stewart was not suggesting that the SNP would hold the balance of power after the general election, which might (depending on exact definitions of "win") contradict any suggestion that Starmer doesn't need Scottish seats to win.  What she actually said was: "Voting SNP helps ensure there's a loud Scottish voice in the ear of the next Labour government."

That's only inconsistent with the idea that Labour will win a big majority based on English votes and seats if you really believe that if Scotland again votes a different way from the rest of the UK, the London government will just be able to use its English majority to ignore that.  Given his ultra-unionist outlook it's possible that Daisley does believe that, but others are entitled to take a different view and to think a contested mandate does matter.  A Labour government with a majority of seats in Scotland would be able to say that it speaks for Scotland and that its actions are one-and-the-same as the will of the Scottish people.  But if another party has a Scottish majority, they will be in a position of moral authority to make representations to the government based on that distinct mandate.

That said, the SNP's messaging about a strong Scottish voice is utterly hopeless from the point of view of electoral strategy.  You need to give people something concrete to vote for, and for that to be straightforward in a cause-and-effect manner.  Labour can say "vote Labour on Thursday, get a new government on Friday", so to compete with that the SNP have got to show how an SNP vote can lead directly to independence.

Before we finish, a reminder that the Scot Goes Pop opinion poll fundraiser urgently needs a boost - let's not leave it in limbo for months.  It's important that not all Scottish opinion polling is commissioned by anti-independence clients - we need to make sure that occasionally questions are asked that Yes supporters want asked.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE.

However if you have a Paypal account the best way to donate is via direct Paypal payment, because that can totally eliminate fees depending on which option you select, and payment usually comes through instantly.  My Paypal email address is:

jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

How the SNP can - and cannot - afford to use independence in their general election campaigning

Stephen Noon said recently that the political energy has moved away from the issue of holding another vote on independence and towards kicking out the Tories at Westminster.  That's correct, but he's interpreting the significance of it wrongly - he thinks it's a force of nature that the SNP were powerless to resist and now just have to make the best of, whereas in fact to some extent it's the product of their own handiwork.  The worst thing that could possibly have happened was Nicola Sturgeon's resignation and the space it opened up for the devolutionist faction within the SNP to junk the clarity of her de facto referendum plan.

Those SNP MPs who think the solution to any electoral problem is ever more caution probably look at the current state of the polls and think they had a lucky escape when the de facto was scrapped.  How absurd it would have been, they probably think, to have tried to maintain that the target was 50% + 1 of the popular vote when it'll be enough of a struggle to end up in the mid-30s and outcount Labour in terms of seats.  How the media would have mocked us for our delusionalism.  And, again, such thinking cannot possibly be more wrongheaded, because the SNP would not be suffering their current plight if Sturgeon was still the leader and the de facto was still the plan, because that would have prevented the energy moving away from independence in the first place.

Of course the media wouldn't necessarily have played along with the SNP about the meaning of the election, but nevertheless that meaning would be currently contested between the "kick out the Tories" narrative and the "endgame for independence" narrative.  Independence supporters tempted to move back to Labour on the (bogus) basis that they need to do that to dislodge the Tories would feel genuinely conflicted when reminded that a 50% + 1 vote for the SNP would reverse the 2014 referendum outcome and establish an outright mandate for independence. By aiming for 50% + 1, the SNP probably wouldn't have got that, but they would have motivated enough independence supporters to vote for them that they might well have retained their seats majority and lived to fight another day.

So how can the SNP galvanise the independence vote in the absence of a de facto?  It may not even be possible to do it, but certainly the way you don't do it is in exactly the way it's obvious the SNP are gagging to try - ie. by blackmailing Yes supporters in a negative manner by saying that even though there's no plan to do anything about independence, people still have to vote SNP because independence will be killed off otherwise.  We saw the reaction from unionist politicians and activists to Tommy Sheppard's article attempting exactly that pitch - they were rubbing their hands with glee, imagining themselves after an SNP defeat saying "independence is dead and we have the SNP's own word for that".  It would be "once in a generation" on steroids.  What Sheppard did must never, ever be done again.

Perhaps a more promising tack would be to look carefully at Labour's own messaging and learn lessons from it.  Labour have their own problem, as we've seen with Anas Sarwar being put on the spot about whether a vote for Labour would be used "as an endorsement of the Union".  Fascinatingly he felt obliged to say it would not be, presumably because he knows Yes supporters moving to Labour are not on the whole ready to "move on from independence".  So could there be some mileage in warning indy supporters that Labour cannot be trusted with their votes?  That all Labour are looking for is a weapon to use against independence?

Additionally, Labour have taken to mocking the supposed complexity of the SNP's messaging, for example the idea that Humza Yousaf would be open to working with Keir Starmer.  "If you want MPs who will work with a Labour government, just vote Labour" is the chorus from Labour activists.  By the same token, couldn't the SNP point out that the idea independence supporters should vote Labour because that will not necessarily be taken as an endorsement of the Union is absurdly convoluted?  "If you want independence, just vote for an independence party"?

I also think Labour have got away with murder in portraying themselves as the "change" option when in fact they represent something almost indistinguishable from the status quo.  It's about time the SNP started loudly pointing out that independence is by far the biggest change on offer from anyone in Scottish politics.

Before we finish, a reminder that the Scot Goes Pop opinion poll fundraiser urgently needs a boost - let's not leave it in limbo for months.  It's important that not all Scottish opinion polling is commissioned by anti-independence clients - we need to make sure that occasionally questions are asked that Yes supporters want asked.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE.

However if you have a Paypal account the best way to donate is via direct Paypal payment, because that can totally eliminate fees depending on which option you select, and payment usually comes through instantly.  My Paypal email address is:

jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk