Survation poll confirms that Labour have lost their lead in Scotland - and suggests the Scottish public wants Devo Max

When the Opinium poll came out the other day showing the SNP seven points ahead, I did raise the possibility that the SNP might have been flattered due to an Opinium house effect, because a couple of previous Opinium polls had also been unusually favourable.  I didn't think that was likely, but I may have to revisit that verdict because I now realise that a Survation poll also came out on Wednesday and showed the SNP and Labour roughly level-pegging.  Nevertheless, that's still a good news story for the SNP, even if it's on a more modest scale than Opinium.  

I really can't emphasis this enough for people who haven't previously looked at polling trends immediately after a general election.  What would usually be happening at this stage is that there would be considerable novelty surrounding the new government - the people who had elected it would be euphoric, and the people who did not elect it would be influenced by that euphoria and some of them would even start thinking that they made a mistake or were too cautious and should have voted in line with the tide.  That would generally push the winning party further ahead in the opinion polls than they were on polling day.  It's a temporary effect but it can usually be expected to last at least a good few months. 

With the added factor that a lot of people seem to be a bit jaded with the SNP government in Edinburgh, it would have been entirely reasonable to expect a Labour lead over the SNP of anything between about 8 and 20 points at this stage.  Instead, Labour have lost their lead entirely, which speaks volumes about just how dreadful Starmer's first few weeks in office have been, and bodes extremely poorly for Anas Sarwar's hopes of becoming First Minister in two years' time.

Scottish voting intentions for the next UK general election (Survation):

SNP 31%

Labour 31%

Conservatives 14%

Reform UK 11%

Liberal Democrats 9%

Greens 3%

Alba 1%

Scottish Parliament constituency ballot:

SNP 31%

Labour 31%

Conservatives 13%

Reform UK 9%

Liberal Democrats 8%

Greens 6%

Alba 1%

Scottish Parliament regional list ballot:

SNP 28%

Labour 26%

Conservatives 14%

Reform UK 10%

Greens 10%

Liberal Democrats 10%

Alba 3%

Seats projection: SNP 40, Labour 39, Conservatives 17, Liberal Democrats 13, Greens 10, Reform UK 10

Survation's data tables round the numbers to two decimal places, and for what it's worth on that measure the SNP have a slight lead across the board: they're 30.93% to 30.76% ahead of Labour on the Holyrood constituency ballot, and 31.16% to 30.80% ahead of Labour in Westminster voting intentions.

The independence numbers are less good than in the Opinium or More In Common polls, but nevertheless Survation becomes one of three out of four pollsters who in anniversary week have shown the Yes vote higher than it was in 2014.

Should Scotland be an independent country?

Yes 46%

No 54%

Survation's client for this poll was Progress Scotland, the organisation run by Angus Robertson.  They've taken a leaf out of my book on this occasion - maybe not intentionally, but it's almost identical to something I did in a Scot Goes Pop / Panelbase poll around four years ago when I asked a simple question about whether Scotland should rejoin the European Union, without specifying whether that would be as an independent country.  I think that's a really useful question, because it forces unionist respondents to answer about what they think should happen to Scotland in particular, rather than the UK as whole, while also allowing them to leave their views on independence to one side.  The pro-European majority this time is even stronger than it was in the Scot Goes Pop poll.

If there was a referendum on membership of the European Union tomorrow, how would you vote on the question: "Should Scotland join the European Union?"

Scotland should join the European Union: 69%

Scotland should not join the European Union: 31%

I know that a non-trivial minority of independence campaigners have misgivings about the EU and hanker after decoupling the independence cause from pro-Europeanism, but when you look at figures like the ones above, it's hard not to conclude that it would be strategically foolish to go down that road, and that if anything, the SNP should be ramping up the pro-EU message and trying to tap into anger about Brexit and Scotland's will being ignored.  Only 20% of Yes voters from 2014 would vote against Scotland joining the EU, while an extraordinary 54% of No voters want back into the EU.

Also encouraging is that by substantial margins, respondents think the Scottish Parliament and not Westminster should have control over pensions, taxation, the cost of living, energy policy, public transport, crime, human rights, employment rights, relations with Europe, the environment, immigration, social security, and the calling of any independence referendum.  The only exceptions, ie. policy areas where respondents prefer Westminster control, are national security and foreign policy - and on the latter the margin is pretty narrow.

In a nutshell, this is a population that strongly favours Devo Max - the genuine type, not the Jackie Bird version.

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