New Labour, Tough Choices : UK or EU?

Kezia Dugdale emerged from another long hibernation today to announce that she will continue to argue for Scotland's place in both the EU and the UK.  As most toddlers and some intelligent hamsters are aware, it's not actually possible to have both of those things, because two weeks ago today the UK voted to leave the EU.  So it will actually be necessary to make a choice.  If you're hopelessly confused about which way Scottish Labour will jump, this Twitter exchange I've just had with the party's one-man online presence Duncan Hothersall may help the mists to clear...or perhaps not.

Duncan Hothersall : @kezdugdale commits to continue to make the case that Scotland is better off as part of the UK.

Scott Russell : so, she'd rather [be] in the UK but out [of the] EU, may as well just vote for Ruth then.

Duncan Hothersall : Suggesting @kezdugdale wants Scotland out of the EU is flatly dishonest. Why would you lie like that?

Me : If she still wants Scotland to stay in the UK, she's arguing for Scotland to leave the EU. That's a fact, Duncan.

Duncan Hothersall : No, that isn't a fact, James. It is in fact a lie. I want Scotland to be in both, just as Kez does.

Me : I want to fly to Jupiter in a golden teapot, but I can't have what I want either. New Labour, Tough Choices : UK or EU?

Duncan Hothersall : So now you're *asking* the question to which you just claimed (falsely) we had provided an answer.

Me : What's YOUR answer, Duncan?

Duncan Hothersall : My answer is that that is not yet the question. The UK remains part of the EU for now.

Me : When it leaves the EU, which it has already decided to do, what will be your answer then?

Duncan Hothersall : We should do what is in the best interests of the most people. That has been my view since 2012 and remains my view.

Me : Will it be in the best interests of most people to remain in the EU, or to remain in the UK?

Duncan Hothersall : That is a judgement which will need to be based on evidence. Not all the necessary evidence is available.

Me : What types of evidence are you awaiting?

Duncan Hothersall : The ultimate deal the UK gets with the EU is pretty much fundamental to this judgement I'd have said!

Me : What will be your red line, Duncan? Anything short of EEA membership, and you'll be a confirmed Yesser?

Duncan Hothersall : We should do what's in the best interests of the most people. We're not in a position to judge what that is today. How can you?

Me : Are you saying you don't have any red lines? Something short of EEA membership might be OK?

Duncan Hothersall : (no reply)

What will Project Fear look like in Indyref 2?

Just a quick note to let you know that I have a new article at the International Business Times, entitled 'After Brexit, London can no longer scare Scotland into remaining in the union'.  You can read it HERE.

Earth to Planet Boris, Earth to Planet Boris : There was a majority in favour of a second independence referendum even BEFORE Thursday

In perhaps the most bizarre statement of his political career to date (and that's quite an effort), Boris Johnson is saying that he "does not detect any real appetite" for a second independence referendum in Scotland any time soon.  As he's been south of the border since the Brexit result was announced, God alone knows how he has actually gone about making these efforts at appetite-detection, but let's call a spade a spade - he's either being unbelievably obtuse here, or he's insulting the intelligence of the English audience his remarks were presumably aimed towards.

Two or three weeks ago, a polling firm made a very systematic and scientific effort to determine whether there was an appetite for a second referendum, and it did so by actually contacting a representative sample of the Scottish population by telephone.  This is what it found -

Agree there should be a second independence referendum within two years in event of UK voting Leave with Scotland voting Remain? (Ipsos-Mori, telephone, Scotland only, 6th-12th June 2016)

Agree 47%
Disagree 45%

That was BEFORE the Daily Record and umpteen unionist politicians and commentators came out in favour of a second referendum in the wake of Thursday's bombshell result.  Does Boris seriously believe that these latest events have made the public's support for Indyref 2 drain away?  Well, no, I suspect he probably doesn't.

*   *   *

On a similar theme, you might be interested in Alasdair Soussi's new article at the Al Jazeera website about the Scottish and Northern Irish reaction to Brexit, and which features quotes from myself, Gerry Hassan and Simon Pia.  You can read it HERE.

This is Budapest calling, Take 2

I always stay up all night on UK election nights (unless I really, really have to be somewhere at the crack of dawn), but I think I may have broken my own personal record on Thursday/Friday by staying awake until almost 9am.  It's amazingly difficult to drag yourself away from the TV screen when you can't quite believe what you're looking at.  I then managed to get four hours' sleep before I received another phone call from Canadian TV asking me to go on for a second time.  Just by chance I still had the iPad I borrowed the previous night, so luckily I was able to do it, and this time I made a point of mentioning my Hungarian friend Anita (who I told you about the other night) and her reaction to the referendum result.  Well, perhaps it would be more accurate to say I put her reaction into my own words, because what she actually said in her early morning email was "WHAT THE **** BRITAIN!!!!!"

It turns out that Anita had managed to complete our 'interview' just before polling day (I sent her the remaining questions by email), but hadn't had the chance to send the voice-file back.  So here it is belatedly, and by the time you get to the end I'm sure you'll be able to imagine exactly how she's feeling now.

Me : You were about fourteen years old when Hungary joined the European Union in 2004. Do you have any memories of that period?

Anita : Yeah, I have loads of them. The first thing we all thought was that we would have the euro, you know, join the eurozone. That didn't happen! But I knew that there were all these new possibilities, that we could move, that we could travel, and you wouldn't need a passport. You could just go anywhere and see the world. I'd never been abroad before, so it was something that I really wanted to do. And everyone wanted to do that.

Me : Did you notice any changes in Hungary in the first few years after it joined the European Union?

Anita : Well yes, I have.  Prices started to go up, and people started to leave - at least, there was the possibility for people to leave, and many started to use that chance, or live with that chance, you know?  For me, when we joined the EU, I was fourteen, and at around that time I started to think about, you know, not spending my life in Hungary - the rest of my life, my whole life in the one place.  I realised I could go elsewhere, I could live elsewhere, I could visit places.  I remember there was a trip planned to go abroad, I think it was Austria - this was pre-2004, and we would have to have passports to go on this trip.  I think it was like a hiking thing...I can't remember, actually.   But the point is we didn't have passports, so we didn't go, and later on with the EU coming in, or us joining the EU, we didn't need it anymore, so you could just go.  In Hungary we have these ID cards, so you have your name on it, age, date of birth, whatever, your nationality, a hologram in your picture, so it's like a valid proof of ID.  Like in Britain you have your passport, and licence for driving...in Hungary we have these ID cards, and that was enough.   With that you could cross borders.  So you get that ID card when you're fourteen.  No matter what, you get that, and with that you have the opportunity to do stuff you couldn't before.  So that was one big change.

I mean, there were other things, like people moaning about prices going up, and they did - to be fair, they did.  Because obviously we joined the EU, and I don't know if there's this thing that you have to match your prices, or it's because of importing, or whatever the reason was.  Prices did go up, and one silly example is the Hungarian equivalent of pound shops.  In Britain you have the pound shops, you go in and you buy anything for a pound.  We had the same in Hungary, they were called the Hungarian hundred forint shops.  Right, so you went in, and you spent one hundred forints on any one item, and that was it.  Now, the equivalent of that would be about thirty pence, so we have hundred forint shops.  And after the EU...well, not immediately after, but shortly after, they went up to become the euro shops, with the one euro, which is the equivalent of over three hundred forints, right?  Whereas previously you would spend one hundred forints, you'd spend three hundred.  So, it's a silly example, but I think it proves the point.

There were good and bad changes.  Obviously people would moan about prices going up, but I think the good overwhelmingly overtook the bad.  I mean, it's not just the everyday examples of "oh, you could actually go abroad", like some people take it so for granted - you know, "we've been to Tenerife, we've been to Gran Canaria, and we're going to Switzerland" or whatever,  Yeah, that's British holidays, going to Tenerife.  For Hungarians, the holiday is going to Balaton, maybe, which is the local...like in the country.  There's huge, huge social differences in that regard.  But yeah, once you had the European Union, you could just go.  And in fact that's what I did.  Not for a few more years after, but I did it nonetheless, and I don't think I would have if it wasn't for the EU.

Me : What does the EU mean to the average person in Hungary?  Is there a fonder attitude to the EU than there is in the UK?

Anita : I think...hmmm, I think it's quite divided, to be honest.  I don't know any person in my generation who has anything against the EU.  Not those that I know, at least, or not those that I speak to, right?  I mean, it gives us opportunities, it gives us a chance to go and broaden our horizons.  Several of my peers have gone abroad to look for jobs and to study, just like me.  I came to Britain after graduating from high school, and went to university here, and worked, and without the EU I wouldn't have been able to do it.  I would have stayed in Hungary and possibly would have ended up doing some menial job in a factory.  Instead I feel like I'm actually achieving something...well, most of the days.  I actually feel like I've made steps to live up to my potential, which I highly doubt I would have been able to do if I stayed in the one place - be it Hungary, be it whatever, you know, I think people need to see the world.  I think people need to experience different cultures and different ways of living.  It's my preference that I stayed, but I know people who go abroad, and then stay for a week, stay for a year, and then go back, but I think the opportunity itself, that you can do that, just means a lot.  So I don't actually know anyone of my generation who sees anything bad about the EU.  Not in terms of economic possibilities, not in terms of intellectual benefits, you know?  As for the older generations, I think there might be some people who are not so fond of it, but in general...I don't know, that's the answer!  I've not lived in Hungary for some years, so this is a tough one to answer.

Me : Apart from making it possible for you to live and work here, what practical benefits have you enjoyed from EU membership since you moved to Scotland?

Anita : It's not just living and working here as such, it's also me going abroad, visiting Iceland, visiting Norway, going back to Hungary via Slovakia without any issues in terms of passports and whatnot being required, I mean all these things.  It's not just Britain as such, it's all the other countries in the EU that I had a chance to interact with. OK, it's not as many as some other people have visited, but still you feel it, and it does make a difference, and knowing that I have the chance to visit more also.  Other than visiting countries, and going on holiday or whatever, there's also...for example, when I was at university I had classmates from different EU countries, and just the possibility to exchange experiences, and knowledge, and interact with them, to find out more about their culture and ways of living, and their viewpoints, you know?  It just broadens your mind, it just gives you...I don't know, it just makes you more aware of things.  You find out about their history, their viewpoints.  And also, being part of the EU, I felt like a part of a community, and a practical benefit...of course, it's important to have a European health insurance card, but it's not just about the practical benefits.  It's also about, as I said, intellectual and other benefits as well.

Me : How did you feel when you first heard there was going to be a referendum on leaving the EU, and in particular that you as an EU citizen wouldn't be able to vote?

Anita : Well, my thought was **** this ****, I cannot believe people are this stupid that they would even call the referendum.  I mean, OK, I can understand it's a democratic thing to do, isn't it?  Holding referendums on things that are important to people, fair enough, do it.  But I mean, personally, myself, I cannot see the problems with the EU for Britain.  I know there are things that Britain maybe could do better independently, maybe, I'm not sure, but I cannot fathom how the benefits of the EU would be less, you know, than the benefits of an independent UK.  I just can't see that happening.  So when I first heard there was going to be a referendum, I was like, "for real?"  OK, well fair enough, if there's going to be a referendum, fine, just give people the chance to vote if they so want it.  But I honestly did not think that it would come to this, in terms of the media coverage, in terms of the scaremongering, in terms of all this stupid rhetoric that people have put on, you know?  Project Fear - what the hell, honestly?  And as for not being able to vote, again : **** this ****.  Honestly, I'm an EU citizen, as you have noticed, I have been here for seven years...coming up in August it's going to be seven years.  I have worked my ass off, paid all my taxes and National Insurance and everything you need.  I'm a good, honest citizen, you don't get any trouble, you know like problem with the police.  Never even used a GP.  I've only ever seen the nurse once, so you can't say I'm like a drain on your system.  I don't get benefits, I don't get anything that all the scaremongering people are talking about in the media.  So personally, I feel quite excluded, I feel like I'm not actually a valid member of this country.  You know, like my voice doesn't count.  I've been here for seven years and I don't get to vote on one of the most crucial questions of my lifetime, in terms of whether Britain should stay or go, or leave the EU.  Because that will have, I assume, quite strong effects on my life, on my future, and still I don't get to have a say.  People from Commonwealth countries who live here do get to have a say.  Just please try to explain to me why someone from India has more of a say in this question than I do!  How is it going to affect their life more, and therefore how do they get a vote, as opposed to me?  How?  Again : **** this ****.

Me : Do you think it's fair that citizens of Commonwealth countries like Canada, India, Swaziland and Barbados have a vote in this referendum, but citizens of other EU countries don't?  If not, why not?

Anita : Well, I think I've just answered that question!  No, I do not think it's fair, I think it's a ****** system, I think it's ridiculous, and I think it's set up in a way that actually encourages EU bashing in a way, and you know, all this scaremongering that "oh, you bloody EU people come here and steal our jobs", well **** you, you can go and work in Hungary if you want.  You know?  Nobody's telling you not to.  And if you don't want to, you can stay here and get a job.  All my jobs since I've lived here, all these seven years, ALL of them, were underpaid, undervalued, and jobs that an ordinary person if you asked them on the street would not quite happily take on!  You know?  And I did.  So you're welcome.

Me : As a matter of principle, do you think the free movement of people across the continent is preferable to a points-based immigration system that gives priority to people with particular skills, regardless of where in the world they come from?

Anita : To be honest, I don't know.  I know Canada has the points-based system.  I don't actually know which other countries do...oh, and maybe Australia.  I'm not sure, I think they do.  Anyway, I can understand, you know, points-based system, OK, if you're well-educated, and well-off and whatnot, and you get a preference,  I can understand in terms of the country looking after itself, and saying, you know what, we only want the best, we don't want the scum of the world.  But I mean, isn't that a bit selfish?  That you're just taking in the best people, so to speak, the best...whatever that means.  Where's equality of opportunity?  Hmmm?  Where's that in the points-based system?  Nowhere.  It presupposes that you can make yourself well-off or well-educated in your own country.  That you can be good enough for Canada if you study in the best university in your own country, and then you can go and live in Canada, because you've already trained.  Well, not every country has the best education system, so you're already excluding those who don't have the opportunity to study at home.  And you're not giving them the chance.  I don't know.  Personally, I don't think it's fair, because as I said, equality of opportunity does not exist in a points-based system.  I can understand from the country's perspective that it's for their own benefit, only taking in the best, but that's a very exclusive system.

Me : What do you think the consequences will be for you and other EU citizens in the UK if there is a Leave vote?  Are you reassured by Michael Gove's assertion that the rights of people who are already here will be unaffected?

Anita : No, I'm not reassured by that.  At all.  He cannot promise it.  I'm not a legal expert, or an EU legal expert, or lawyer, or whatever, but I know that the rights given by the EU will not be unaffected, because the UK will not be part of the EU anymore if they leave, will they?  So they will have to come up with new laws and new regulations, and policies and all.  They cannot promise that the law will remain the same.  One of the main points of the Leave campaign is that they will no longer have to abide by EU regulations, so obviously that applies especially to immigration.  So nope, I'm not reassured at all.  Especially since one of the biggest things they always chant is "oh, bloody EU people coming in and stealing the jobs".  Well, if they vote to leave, isn't that one of the pulling-powers?  The Leave campaign saying they can regulate all of the people coming in, so that they will not steal the jobs?  No.  The consequences will be a big ****-up, and uncertainty.  Which is not very nice, is it?

Me : On a scale of 1 to 10, how relieved will you be if Britain votes to remain in the EU?

Anita : Er...100.

Me : Finally, a question about Hungarian politics.  The Prime Minister, Mr Orban, is one of the most controversial heads of government in Europe.  On the face of it, his stated desire to replace liberal democracy with an "illiberal state" seems to run counter to the EU's values.  Why do you think his ideology has resonated so much with the Hungarian electorate?

Anita : Well, he is...oh God.  Honestly, that man.  Right, let's focus on the question, before I go off on a rant.  It's because Hungary is quite old-headed, I think, in the way that they always want to be able to do their own thing.  I mean we've had the Turks, we've had the Habsburgs, we've had the Russians, we've had our share of people coming in and telling us what to do.  And the EU sometimes feels like that as well.  So I think when people say "we don't want to be ruled by all these things", that's what they are thinking of, all these past hurts.  I don't know, that's the only reason I can think of, to be honest.  But I mean, as I said I've not been in Hungary for the past seven years.  But yeah, he is quite controversial, in that he is going after what he wants, and not giving a **** how it comes across, to be honest.

On the forthcoming independence polls

The former Labour MP Eric Joyce has a piece at Wings Over Scotland arguing that there should be a very quick independence referendum provided that the polls next week show 60% support for independence, which he is quite sure they will do.  My own view is that there has been a material change of circumstances and that people should therefore be given a second chance to express their view regardless of what the polls show (unless perhaps they show a significant drop in support for independence, in which case there wouldn't be sufficient demand to justify it - but obviously that's not going to happen).  It should now be clear for all to see that the myth stating that there is always a swing back towards the status quo over the course of a referendum campaign is just that - a myth.  As uncomfortable a thought as this may be, it's only really during the heat of the campaign that we'll find out whether a majority are prepared to vote Yes - and that's true regardless of whether the polls months or years in advance show a majority for Yes or No.

On the question of what the forthcoming polls will actually show, I agree it's perfectly possible that they'll be as high as 60% for Yes given the unprecedented situation we now find ourselves in, but I don't see how we can be certain of that given the underlying complexities of public opinion.  Yes, we know anecdotally that a great many liberal unionists are switching to Yes, but what we don't know is how the minority of independence supporters who voted for Brexit (because of immigration, I mean, rather than for tactical reasons) are quietly feeling right now.  My guess is that most of them will stick with Yes, but we'll have to wait for the polls to find out for sure.  Basically what I'm saying is that I hope we're not talking ourselves into a situation where a clear lead for independence is going to look like a disappointment if it happens to fall short of an arbitrary figure.

The other thing I would say is that whatever the Yes figure is next week (assuming there's been a significant boost), it's likely there'll be some gradual slippage as the weeks and months wear on, and we should be mentally prepared for that and not worry too much about it.  Clearly there'll be no "getting back to normal" on Planet Brexit, but by the end of the year we might well end up with a Yes figure midway between what it was before Thursday and whatever it is now.  With a bit of luck, that'll still be plenty.

Memo to Theresa Villiers : You're on a loser with this one

I was just watching Channel 4 News, and midway through it, Theresa Villiers (Northern Ireland Secretary and Leave campaigner) said something truly extraordinary. First she said that she agreed with Ruth Davidson that now is not the right time for an independence referendum, and then she stated that Scotland had voted to remain in the United Kingdom at a time when it already knew that a UK referendum on EU membership was on the cards.

Well, that's very curious, because I suspect the people of Scotland might just remember that Ruth Davidson herself, in a high-profile TV debate during the independence referendum, informed voters that her own party was unlikely to win the 2015 general election (let alone win an overall majority), and that we could therefore vote No safe in the knowledge than an EU referendum would NOT happen. I'm not sure how the position can be much clearer - the narrow No vote was won specifically on the premise that it would safeguard our EU membership, rather than imperil it within less than two years.

I'm afraid Ms Villiers will have to learn to understand that agreeing with the leader of the Scottish Tory party is not a part-time occupation.

YouGov on-the-day poll predicts narrow Remain victory

Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?

Remain 52% (+1)
Leave 48% (-1)

This is very reminiscent of the YouGov on-the-day poll for the indyref, which showed the tiniest of last-minute swings in favour of the status quo.  The difference is, though, that Remain are on 52% compared to 54% for No two years ago, which leaves open the potential for a Leave victory if YouGov are just a little out.  As it happens, they were a little out two years ago, but it was Yes that they overestimated by 1%.  We'll see.

UPDATE : Ipsos-Mori's on-the-day phone poll looks more convincing for Remain -

Remain 54% (+2)
Leave 46% (-2)

So it does look like there's been a genuine late swing towards the status quo, albeit not a massive one.  Leave can only really win now if there's been some kind of systemic problem with the public polls - although that's scarcely unheard of.

UPDATE II : To give a tiny glimmer of hope to Leave, it looks like the YouGov figures have flattered Remain slightly due to rounding - it's actually Remain 51.6%, Leave 48.4%.

Good evening Edinburgh, this is Budapest calling. Here is how the Hungarian jury would have voted tonight.

As we approach the end of polling, it's interesting to note that Stephen Bush of the New Statesman is still saying that he thinks we might be looking at a Leave vote. That should be taken seriously, because he was one of the first to confidently predict that Jeremy Corbyn would win the Labour leadership, and he was also closer to the truth than most about the general election. However, his assessment about tonight is based on an assumption of relatively low turnout. The mood music on social media actually suggests a very high turnout, although there's weirdly contradictory information out there if you look hard enough - different people in London saying turnout is either abysmally low or heading for a record-breaking high.

Turnout in London is particularly important, as is turnout in Scotland and Northern Ireland, because those are likely to be Remain's three best areas (unless you count Gibraltar). Between them they make up about one-quarter of the UK's population.

Anyway, as we wait for that mystery to be solved, I thought I'd treat you (and this won't take long) to an abortive interview I did a couple of weeks ago with my Hungarian friend Anita, who has lived in Scotland for most of the last seven years. As you might expect, she's not best pleased about the fact that she has no influence over a decision that will arguably affect her more than the British and Commonwealth citizens who do have a vote. I was going to ask her fourteen questions and really give her a chance to sound off, but unfortunately circumstances intervened and it came to an abrupt end just after I asked Question 2.

Me : You were about fourteen years old when Hungary joined the European Union in 2004. Do you have any memories of that period?

Anita : Yeah, I have loads of them. The first thing we all thought was that we would have the euro, you know, join the eurozone. That didn't happen! But I knew that there were all these new possibilities, that we could move, that we could travel, and you wouldn't need a passport. You could just go anywhere and see the world. I'd never been abroad before, so it was something that I really wanted to do. And everyone wanted to do that.

Me : Did you notice anything different about Hungary after it joined the EU?

Anita : Prices went up, I noticed that. People started to leave...

And...well, yeah, that was it. Not quite Frost/Nixon, but clearly I have to walk before I can run.

Remain take narrow lead in final Ipsos-Mori telephone poll

If you're ever trying to organise a surprise party, it might be an idea not to mention it to Ben Page of Ipsos-Mori.  Having told the world the other day that two of his firm's competitors were about to publish polls showing Remain in the lead, he's spent the last couple of hours undermining the embargo on his own poll by dropping broad hints on Twitter that it was going to show a swing to Remain.  In all honesty, though, given that Leave have been dropping like a stone on the betting markets, it's quite striking that the Remain lead is as low as it is - it's lower than the ComRes phone poll reported last night (in spite of the fact that the fieldwork is much more up to date), and it's in 'statistical tie' territory.  Depending on the reports they're getting about turnout on the ground, the Leave campaign may feel this still puts them in with a genuine shout.

Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?

Remain 49% (+6)
Leave 46% (-3)

UPDATE : The Populus poll is much better for Remain -

Remain 55%
Leave 45%

That's a real oddity, because it's an online poll, and the fieldwork is only marginally more up to date than the YouGov and Opinium online polls that had a roughly 50/50 split. There have been some suggestions that Populus (who haven't published an EU poll for months) have been doing the private polling for the Remain campaign, so if those polls have been quietly doing the rounds in elite circles and have been markedly better for Remain all along, that could explain the odd sense of certainty in some quarters about today's outcome. But it's worth remembering that private polling isn't inherently more accurate than public polling. It'll be interesting to see whether Populus have been doing anything unusual, and perhaps reassigning Don't Knows to Remain on the basis of answers to supplementary questions in the way that ComRes did last night.

UPDATE : We now have a bit more detail from the Ipsos-Mori poll (although not the full datasets yet). The most intriguing point is that when a slightly different turnout filter is used, the Remain lead drops to 2% - a 51% to 49% split with Don't Knows excluded.

It's human nature to react to polls in the order in which we see them, but it should be stressed that the Ipsos-Mori poll is just as up-to-date as the Populus poll - both were conducted yesterday and the day before. And of course Ipsos-Mori is a telephone poll, so in the ultimate role-reversal it's actually the telephone poll that's keeping Leave's hopes alive.

If it's Brexit, what then for Scotland?

Just a quick note to let you know that I have a new article at the International Business Times about the potential impact of a Leave vote tomorrow on Scottish politics : the powers that would be automatically transferred from Brussels to Holyrood, the constitutional crisis that might ensue if Westminster tried to breach the Sewel convention by clawing some of those powers back, and of course the very real prospect of an early second independence referendum.  You can read the article HERE.

Leave edge into the lead in new Survey Monkey poll

Hot on the heels of YouGov, we now have more apparent evidence that the tragic murder of Jo Cox has not affected public opinion on the EU referendum.  Today's new Survey Monkey poll was conducted entirely after the tragedy, and although the one-point increase in the Leave vote isn't statistically significant, there's certainly no sign of the swing back to Remain that many people seemed to be accepting as an established fact yesterday.

Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union? (Survey Monkey, 17th-20th June)

Remain 48% (n/c)

Leave 49% (+1)

Like YouGov, this is an online poll, so there remains the possibility that phone polls will detect a pro-Remain swing that online firms can't.  The Survation poll at the weekend (which so far is the only phone poll to be entirely conducted after Ms Cox's death) showed changes that were consistent with that theory, but they were also perfectly consistent with a normal reversion to the mean after an unusually good poll for Leave last time around.  The next phone poll (which I gather is expected to be another Survation poll in a matter of minutes from now) could tell us quite a lot.

UPDATE : And right on cue, here is the Survation phone poll -

Remain 45% (n/c)
Leave 44% (+2)

Again, the improvement for Leave is not statistically significant, but we now have reasonably compelling evidence from a series of polls (including both online and phone polls) that there has not been a substantial drift towards Remain in recent days.  So the Leave campaign are entitled to breathe an enormous sigh of relief - although opinions differ on whether their current position is strong enough to withstand what may be coming their way over the next 48 hours, I don't see how anyone can seriously deny that they are very much still in the game.

One detail from the Survation poll that will be of some concern to the Remain campaign is that undecided voters don't break for Remain when pressed - they're essentially split down the middle.  YouGov last night did find that the undecideds were slightly more inclined towards Remain, but even if those people had been added into the headline figures, Leave would still have had a very slender advantage.

We've heard a lot about the similarities between this referendum and the indyref, but given the closeness of the race it's worth reminding ourselves of one of the crucial differences.  In September 2014, it always seemed likely that any sort of differential turnout was going to favour the No campaign.  They were doing better among both older voters and affluent voters - two demographics that are disproportionately likely to drag themselves to the polling station.  This time it's a much more mixed picture - older voters have consistently shown themselves to be far more likely to vote Leave, while the affluent are backing Remain.  Those factors may cancel each other out, although if anything the rumours about how the postal voting is going suggest it's conceivable that Leave could even enjoy a net benefit from differential turnout.  So certain commentators may be barking up the wrong tree when they point to the divergence between the final indyref polls and the actual result, and suggest that the current polls are bound to be underestimating Remain for that reason.

*  *  *

SCOT GOES POP POLL OF POLLS

50/50 ONLINE/TELEPHONE AVERAGE :

Remain 45.5% (+0.1)
Leave 45.8% (n/c)

ONLINE AVERAGE :

Remain 44.1% (+0.6)
Leave 46.1% (+0.4)

TELEPHONE AVERAGE :

Remain 46.8% (-0.4)
Leave 45.5% (-0.3)

(The Poll of Polls takes account of all polls that were conducted at least partly within the last seven days. The online average is based on seven polls - three from YouGov, two from Survey Monkey, one from Opinium and one from BMG. The telephone average is based on six polls - three from Survation, one from ORB, one from BMG and one from Ipsos-Mori.)

Leave back in the lead in stunning YouGov upset

This is a suitably surprising end to a bizarre day.  In the morning and early afternoon, the markets (of both the betting and financial varieties) were pointing heavily towards Remain, which led to some suspicions that there might be inside knowledge of forthcoming poll numbers.  Those suspicions seemed to have been borne out when Ben Page of Ipsos-Mori eccentrically revealed on Twitter that two of his firm's competitors were about to release polls putting Remain in the lead.  We knew that YouGov and ORB polls were pending, so those seemed like the most obvious candidates - which suggested a very real chance that a third successive YouGov poll might show a swing to Remain, and perhaps vindicate the over-excitable commentators who have been "calling" the referendum for Remain on the basis of seemingly no evidence whatever.  But as it turns out, one of the Remain leads was in fact a NatCen survey that took place over an extended four-week period, and that therefore tells us absolutely nothing about very recent trends.  Against all expectations, the new YouGov poll actually puts Leave back in the lead -

Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?

Remain 42% (-2)
Leave 44% (+1)

The fieldwork was apparently conducted between Friday and Sunday, so was entirely after the murder of Jo Cox.  The YouGov poll immediately before the tragedy had an identical result to this one, so on the face of it there doesn't appear to have been any direct and lasting impact on public opinion.  (If there has been an impact, it's being masked by the quirks of sampling variation.)

The other half of what we were expecting to happen did happen - the ORB phone poll put Remain in the lead, but there's some pretty good news to be found for Leave even there.  As I've mentioned a number of times, the ORB phone series has been driving me mad because there don't seem to be any definitive 'headline figures' - the Telegraph (who commission the polls) headline the figures that exclude anyone who isn't absolutely certain to vote, while ORB themselves usually seem to prefer the unfiltered numbers.  On the latter count, the Remain lead has actually fallen from 5% to 2% over the last week, leaving us firmly in 'statistical tie' territory -

Remain 49% (n/c)
Leave 47% (+3)

Remarkably, that's the second-best showing for Leave in the unfiltered sample of any ORB phone poll since the series started in March.  (And in retrospect, the outright best showing for them looks like it was a fluke result, because no other phone pollster was reporting similar numbers at the time.)

Curiously, though, the turnout-filtered figures (which until now have generally been better for Leave) shoot off in completely the opposite direction -

Remain 53% (+5)
Leave 46% (-3)

As I always used to point out about TNS polls during the indyref, the trend shown by turnout-filtered figures tends to be much more volatile, because significantly fewer respondents are left after the filter is applied.  So it's very hard to say whether this poll is picking up that Remain supporters have genuinely become much more likely to vote over the last week, or whether the greater margin of error in the filtered numbers is causing an illusory Remain boost.  For what it's worth, YouGov have failed to detect any sudden reversal of the enthusiasm gap - their poll continues to suggest that Leave voters are more likely to be absolutely certain to vote.

*  *  *

SCOT GOES POP POLL OF POLLS

As a final adjustment to the time-frame covered by the Poll of Polls, from now on only polls that were at least partly conducted within the last seven days will be taken into account.  As I mentioned last week, I've made an executive decision that ORB's turnout-filtered numbers will be used for the rest of the campaign - in the last update that was boosting Leave slightly, but now it's helping Remain.

50/50 ONLINE/TELEPHONE AVERAGE :

Remain 45.4% (+0.8)
Leave 45.8% (-0.8)

ONLINE AVERAGE :

Remain 43.5% (+1.2)
Leave 45.7% (+0.3)

TELEPHONE AVERAGE :

Remain 47.2% (+0.4)
Leave 45.8% (-2.0)

(The Poll of Polls takes account of all polls that were conducted at least partly within the last seven days. The online average is based on six polls - three from YouGov, one from Opinium, one from Survey Monkey and one from BMG. The telephone average is based on five polls - two from Survation, one from ORB, one from BMG and one from Ipsos-Mori.)

New EU referendum podcast

Just a quick note to let you know that myself and Christopher Silver are the guests on this week's edition of the Newsnet podcast, hosted as always by Derek Bateman.  We discuss the horrific murder of Jo Cox, the potential implications for the EU referendum, and also how a Leave vote might affect Scotland and the rest of the continent.  You can listen to the podcast HERE.

So where now?

For the first time yesterday, I briefly came to the conclusion that the balance of probability slightly favoured a Leave victory.  I was very surprised by the complete turnaround shown by Ipsos-Mori, which until now had tended to be the most Remain-friendly of telephone pollsters.  I would have expected the Remain lead to be sharply down in their new poll, but a very clear Leave lead was a shock.  (That was partly due to methodological changes, but even so.)  A Survation phone poll also suggested a small Leave lead, and with some online firms reporting a Leave lead of as much as seven points, it seemed to me the likelihood was that Leave had built up just enough of a cushion to have a decent chance of holding on.

But then came the tragic murder of Labour MP Jo Cox yesterday afternoon.  That's dominated the news for more than 24 hours now, and is bound to have some kind of impact on public opinion, even if it's entirely unclear so far what that impact will be.  It may be direct or indirect (or both), and could be any of the following -

* Floating voters who had begun to swing towards Leave may take a step back and think "what is this country becoming?", and revert to Remain.

* There may be a backlash against the attempts by some on the Remain side to (with varying degrees of subtlety) politicise the tragedy.  That could help Leave.

* There could be an effect on turnout.  The 2004 Madrid bombings - which occurred days before a national election - didn't seem to directly change many people's voting intentions, but it did lead to a bigger turnout than anticipated, which helped the socialists to an unexpected victory.  If younger people turn out to vote in solidarity with the Cox family, it could help Remain.  But if the turnout is depressed by the suspension of campaigning, it could boost Leave.

* The public may conclude that the tragedy has no relevance at all to the referendum, but will still find themselves indirectly influenced by the suspension of campaigning.  There have been some suggestions that the Leave camp will lose the momentum they had built up, but I suspect Remain might have the greatest problem in this scenario.  The advocates of the status quo tend to have the most cards to play at the close of a referendum campaign, and Remain have effectively lost two days that they presumably would otherwise have spent ramping up apocalyptic fears about the economy.  (Given the public mood after Ms Cox's death, it's also going to be hard to resume a relentlessly negative, fear-based campaign when hostilities resume.)

If I was going to guess, I would say that Remain are more likely to benefit in one way or another, but we'll just have to wait for polling evidence.  The information will probably come gradually - first we'll get polls that were only partly conducted after Ms Cox's death, and only after that will we get definitive evidence of any shift in opinion.  As always, it's also worth remembering that a substantial minority of votes have already been cast by post - and there are strong rumours that Leave have done very well so far.

Cameron and Osborne reaching the end of the road as two more telephone polls put Leave in the lead

Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?

Ipsos-Mori, telephone poll :

Remain 47% (-10)
Leave 53% (+10)

Survation, telephone poll :

Remain 42% (-2)
Leave 45% (+7)

Indecision 2016

A few people have been taking me to task in the comments section about my uncertainty over how to vote next Thursday - they reckon it's a no-brainer that every independence supporter in Scotland should vote Remain, because we need to be able to point to as strong a Remain majority as possible. I think it might be an idea to repost my response here, so that I don't have to repeat myself another fifty times over the next week!

"I take an entirely different view, Rolfe, and I must say that I think 'risk' is the wrong word in this context. If the tactical objective is a UK Leave/Scottish Remain, then every single person in Scotland is simultaneously voting both for and against that outcome. That's simply a fact, and there's no way of avoiding it. The UK result looks like it could be very close (and I would still say Remain are slightly more likely to win), whereas the Scottish result looks pretty clear-cut. If that wasn't the case, and if Leave had a big UK lead, there would be overwhelming logic for independence supporters to vote Remain, but that isn't where we are. A Remain win of 65% to 35% in Scotland coupled with a Remain win of 50.1% to 49.9% across the UK isn't going to get us a second independence referendum, but a Remain win of 63% to 37% in Scotland coupled with a Leave win of 50.1% to 49.9% across the UK could just do the trick. That's the dilemma, and I have to say I think the likes of Bill and 'Sales - Select Wallpaper' are in danger of losing sight of the fact that Scottish votes do contribute directly to the overall UK outcome. We aren't having our own separate referendum here.

As I've said before, the problem with tactical voting this time is not that it can't or won't work, but rather that the side-benefits of Brexit for the independence movement may not actually be important enough to compensate for the major downsides of being stuck outside the EU if we don't get independence. That's why I'm still in two minds."

Just to reiterate : of the two main side-benefits that I think might arise from Brexit, I'd say greater powers for the Scottish Parliament is much the stronger potential argument for voting Leave, and the prospect of engineering a second independence referendum is the weaker. I'm also not trying to influence anyone else's vote - it would be a bit difficult to do that anyway, given that I genuinely haven't made up my mind yet on what I think the best choice would be! I've simply been thinking aloud about how to cast my own vote. There's no doubt at all that the vast majority of SNP members will vote Remain, and that may well be a very good thing. SNP voters are another matter, of course - we know from opinion polls that a sizeable minority will vote Leave, and I personally know of a couple of passionate Yes voters who had "I'm With Nicola" plastered all over their Facebook profiles only a few weeks ago, but who are now backing Brexit without seeing any contradiction. They're doing that because of immigration, though, not because of more powers for Holyrood or a second indyref. I suspect there are only a tiny number of people who are flirting with a Leave vote for the specific reasons I am, so even if you think it's unwise, I don't think you should fret too much about it.

UK establishment rocked as Ipsos-Mori TELEPHONE poll reveals Scottish people support second independence referendum in the event of Brexit

In the comments section yesterday, Calum Findlay bemoaned the fact that there have been very, very few full-scale Scottish polls giving voting intention for the EU referendum.  That's left us flying blind to some extent, because public opinion throughout the UK seems to have been moving pretty fast in recent weeks, and we've only been able to guess whether it's been moving in Scotland too, and if so, whether it's been happening at a faster or slower rate.  Today's new full-scale Scottish poll for STV (conducted by Ipsos-Mori via telephone with no expense spared!) finally answers those questions, and should largely assuage any fears that Remain can be caught north of the border.

Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?  (Ipsos-Mori, telephone, Scotland only)

Remain 58% (-8)
Leave 33% (+4)

That's pretty much as I would have expected -  it would have been naive to think that Scotland was immune to the Brexit surge, but the Remain lead was so enormous to begin with that the swing would have had to be much, much greater north of the border before there was any chance of the race looking even vaguely tight.

On the rare occasions when different polling firms have conducted full-scale Scottish polls close together, they have sometimes produced wildly different estimates of the Remain lead - for example, in late April, Ipsos-Mori put the gap at 37 points, but Panelbase said it was just 24.  That can presumably be attributed to the telephone/online divergence witnessed throughout the UK, and which now seems to have either diminished significantly or (if ICM are to be believed) vanished altogether.  But we can't totally exclude the possibility that Ipsos-Mori are overstating the Remain lead, perhaps because Scottish Leave voters feel uncomfortable about admitting their intentions to a telephone interviewer.  (You could argue the case that a Leave vote is more 'taboo' here than it is in England.)  Even if there's something in that, though, a 25 point lead gives us a pretty decent margin for error.  Remain have in-built advantages over the coming week - if there's a late swing, history suggests it's somewhat more likely to be towards the status quo, and Ipsos-Mori show that undecided voters are leaning towards Remain.  Taking all of that together, it now seems almost impossible to imagine that Remain won't win in Scotland, and probably by a decent (if not necessarily overwhelming) margin.

As was the case in the (relatively) recent full-scale Scottish polls from ICM and TNS, respondents were asked whether they supported a second independence referendum in the event of Brexit.  This time the result was different -

Agree there should be a second independence referendum within two years in event of UK voting Leave with Scotland voting Remain?  (Ipsos-Mori, telephone, Scotland only)

Agree 47%
Disagree 45%

Someone has pointed out in the comments section below that the STV website's reporting of this finding is very misleading.  I'd go further than that, actually - I think it's absolutely bloody disgraceful.  They've effectively presented 'don't knows' and 'neutrals' as people who disagree with a second referendum, and claimed that "a majority of Scots do not back a second referendum in the event of the UK as a whole voting to Leave but Scotland voting to Remain in the European Union". I mean, WHAT THE HELL?! If anyone had tried to spin the ICM and TNS polls as showing that "a majority of Scots do not oppose a second referendum in the event of Brexit" (which technically would have been an accurate statement), they would have been greeted with a chorus of helpless laughter.

Mr Aidan Kerr, have a long, hard look at yourself in the mirror, and ask yourself why you've written the article in that way. This poll shows narrow SUPPORT for a second independence referendum in the event of Brexit. The numbers speak for themselves - you can see them, I can see them, the dogs on the street can see them. I trust we're not going to witness any repeat of this nonsense on the TV news bulletin tonight - and if we do, serious (and fully justified) questions about bias are going to have to be asked.

Third poll out of three today to put Leave ahead - and it's another telephone poll

Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?  (ORB, telephone fieldwork) 

Remain 48% (n/c)
Leave 49% (+2)

For telephone polls, ORB now filter their headline numbers by certainty to vote, which generally helps Leave.  Among the unfiltered sample, Remain are still ahead, but their five point advantage is dramatically down from the peak of twenty points recorded just a few weeks ago (when some commentators were declaring it 'game over').

*  *  *

UPDATE : And we also have a YouGov online poll, which reports the Leave lead jumping from one point to seven.  That could be pretty significant, because before now there had only really been one recent online poll showing a dramatic swing to Leave (the big shifts were generally confined to phone polls).

Remain 39% (-3)
Leave 46% (+3)

That isn't quite a record-breaking Leave lead for YouGov, but it's certainly the highest since the firm reported the mini-recovery for Remain in late February (which other firms curiously failed to pick up).  Even before that, a 7-point Leave lead would have looked unusually big - it was only bettered once, by a 9-point lead in early February, which in retrospect was probably a fluke.

Note for "international thriller writer" and "Thatcherite outlaw" Sean Thomas, if he happens to be reading this : No, the Scottish Sun did not come out for independence in 2014.  They ummed and ahhed about it, but in the end they were neutral (and if anything, their polling day front page might have been said to subtly steer readers towards No).  So the English edition is going out on more of a limb this time by backing a Leave vote outright.

Britain could be on the brink of leaving the EU, as ICM online AND phone polls give Leave a decent lead

Until now, it's been possible to believe that the apparent spectacle of phone polls moving sharply in favour of Leave was illusory.  There had only been a handful of phone polls over the last two-and-a-bit weeks - an ICM poll which put Leave in the lead, and which many people thought might be a rogue because it was conducted over a Bank Holiday, and two ORB polls which showed a narrow Remain lead on the headline numbers, but which still had very substantial 'underlying' Remain leads among the whole sample.  But most of the reassurance for Remain has just been dramatically stripped away with the publication of a new ICM phone poll that shows the Leave lead growing still further.  There's no Bank Holiday get-out clause this time, so the new poll essentially corroborates the previous one from the same firm.  Even taking into account the margin of error, two consecutive polls showing a small Leave lead make it very unlikely that Remain are currently ahead (if ICM's phone methodology is basically sound, that is).

As was the case two weeks ago, ICM conducted a simultaneous online poll, and found that the previous huge divergence between online and phone polling has vanished into thin air.

Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?

Telephone poll :

Remain 45% (+3)

Leave 50% (+5)

Online poll :

Remain 44% (n/c)

Leave 49% (+2)

As always in Britain-wide polls, the Scottish subsamples are tiny and unreliable.  But for what it's worth, the phone subsample puts Remain ahead by 54% to 44%, and the online subsample puts Remain ahead by 54% to 39%.  So as of this moment, we appear to be on course for the UK Leave / Scottish Remain 'doomsday scenario' that is thought could trigger an early second independence referendum.

When we see polls like these, it's worth taking a step back and recalling that the referendum is already well underway - a substantial minority of people have already voted by post, and in some cases they did so quite some time ago.  So if ICM are right, Remain are in a bit of a pickle here, because some of the result is already set in stone.  Pro-Europeans will be banking on a late swing back towards the status quo, which does often happen in referendums (although if it does occur, there's no guarantee it'll be on any great scale), and possibly on ICM proving to be less accurate than other firms.  It's perfectly possible, for example, that the next Ipsos-Mori phone poll will still show some kind of Remain lead, because so far Ipsos-Mori have tended to be more Remain-friendly than other phone firms.  But there again, Ipsos-Mori reported an enormous swing towards Yes as they converged with other firms at the end of the indyref campaign, so absolutely nothing can be taken for granted at this stage.

*  *  *

SCOT GOES POP POLL OF POLLS

Today's new update of the Poll of Polls marks the first time Leave have been ahead on all three averages.  However, the telephone average is based on just two polls, so should be treated with a bit of caution.

50/50 ONLINE/TELEPHONE AVERAGE :

Remain 44.8% (-0.2)
Leave 46.9% (+1.4)

ONLINE AVERAGE :

Remain 43.0% (+0.1)
Leave 45.3% (+0.4)

TELEPHONE AVERAGE :

Remain 46.5% (-0.5)
Leave 48.5% (+2.5)

(The Poll of Polls takes account of all polls that were conducted at least partly within the last two weeks. The online average is based on ten polls - four from YouGov, three from ICM, two from Opinium and one from ORB. The telephone average is based on two polls - one from ORB and one from ICM.)

A few responses on the EU referendum dilemma

There was quite a bit of reaction to my post the other night about the dilemma I'm facing on how to vote in the EU referendum.  Some of the points raised were perfectly fair, but there were also quite a number of misconceptions that I'd like to clear up.

First of all (and I've now made this clear in three different blogposts), I am not particularly arguing for tactical voting in the referendum.  Of the two potential arguments in favour of a Leave vote that I raised, I think the prospect of more powers for the Scottish Parliament is much the stronger one, and tactical voting is much the weaker.  The point I did make, though, is that tactical voting is perfectly viable, in the sense that there is a reasonably simple calculation to make if you want to maximise the chances of a UK Leave vote being coupled with a Scottish Remain vote.  As things stand (and the polls may change dramatically over the next ten days, in which case the calculation will also change), a Scottish Remain vote does not look in much doubt, whereas the UK result could go either way - meaning that a budding tactical voter should clearly be more preoccupied with trying to influence the UK outcome.

The reason why voting on a tactical basis alone isn't a good idea is not that it can't or won't work, but rather that it's open to question whether the tactical objective of a UK Leave/Scottish Remain is actually a good thing or a bad thing.  I think there's a better than even chance that such an outcome would lead to an early independence referendum, but it's anyone's guess whether we would go on to win that vote - and if we didn't, we'd then be stuck inside the UK and outside the EU, partially as a result of our own handiwork.

To return to the practicalities of tactical voting, though, a number of you pointed out that a UK Leave/Scottish Remain combination isn't enough in itself - we'd need a significant majority for Remain in Scotland to emphasise the gulf between the public's wishes on each side of the border.  I don't dispute that for a moment, but my most basic assumption about tactical voting hasn't changed since we discussed the issue in respect of the Holyrood election.  The point is that any tactical voting is likely to be very small in scale.  It'll be restricted to political obsessives, and therefore won't make much of a dent in the seemingly huge Remain lead in this part of the world.

Aha, comes the next objection, in that case the whole exercise is futile, because we'd need to drag the Scottish Remain vote all the way down to the low 50s before we'd have any chance of influencing the UK outcome.  Well no, that's not true, actually, and the low 50s figure is plucked out of thin air.  If the final batch of polls show the UK result to be on a knife-edge, we won't know how many votes are required to swing the balance between Remain and Leave.  It's conceivable (unlikely, but conceivable) that it could be a very, very small number.  In the notorious Florida election in 2000, there were roughly 6 million votes cast, and the final gap between George W Bush and Al Gore was just 537 votes.

Turning now to what I consider to be the sounder potential reason for voting Leave, ie. a repatriation of powers to the Scottish Parliament, a number of you were adamant that this was a bogus argument, either because the EU's powers on agriculture, fisheries, etc. would automatically revert to the UK government after Brexit, or because the UK government would just steal those powers back anyway.  The first of those two claims is pretty easy to deal with, because there is no doubt about the legal position.  Unless a power is explicitly reserved to Westminster, it is devolved to Scotland - except to the extent that EU law has supremacy.  Matters such as agriculture and fisheries are not reserved, and therefore after Brexit those powers would default to Holyrood.  Now it's quite true that the UK parliament can change the rules to suit itself, but there's no sleight of hand available to them - they'd have to clearly and openly strip the Scottish Parliament of the powers.  That would almost certainly mean the first substantive breach of the Sewel convention since 1999.  Professor Alan Trench, for example, has been explicit in his view that the Sewel convention has evolved to mean that powers can't be added or removed without the consent of the Scottish Parliament, which in this case is surely not going to be forthcoming.  By any stretch of the imagination, a major breach of Sewel constitutes a 'material change of circumstances', and would trigger a constitutional crisis.

What might happen, though, is that the UK government will recognise the danger, and instead of simply grabbing the powers back, will say to the devolved administrations : "Let's be reasonable about this, chaps.  There has to be a certain amount of central control over agriculture and fisheries, so let's sit down at a constitutional conference and thrash out the appropriate post-Brexit distribution of powers."  So whichever way you look at it, there would be opportunities for Scotland - either the EU powers would simply revert to Holyrood, or there would be a massive constitutional crisis in which London would be seen as the transgressor, or the Westminster government would be forced to open up the UK's constitutional framework for negotiation between the various administrations (and it could be expected that Westminster would have to make big concessions during those negotiations if they wanted agreement on clawing back the agriculture and fisheries powers).

*  *  *

During the televised referendum debate on Thursday night, I had another reminder of how certain things that should be totally uncontroversial have somehow become unsayable.  I made a straightforward observation that seems to me to be irrefutable - that five of the six participants in the debate were female, that the presenter was also female, and that if the situation had been reversed there would have been complaints.  Simply as a result of pointing that out, I lost roughly ten followers on Twitter (unlikely to be a coincidence, because it's unusual to lose that many in one night), and I was deluged with indignant responses - one or two of which I considered to be downright offensive.  In a nutshell, the charge was that I had some sort of "problem" with the very rare occurrence of a mostly-female panel, which should in fact be unreservedly applauded by every right-thinking person on the planet.

To state the bleedin' obvious, identifying a slam-dunk example of a double-standard is not the same thing as arguing that all-female or mostly-female panels are in any way undesirable.  The people who instantly complain about each and every example of a mostly-male panel on TV or radio have really got to get the story straight here.  It's perfectly reasonable to argue that the frequency of male-dominated panels should be reduced, but if you're going to say that a female-dominated panel is a "wonderful" sight (as many did), you can't then say that male-dominated panels should be eradicated.  If a mostly-female panel is sometimes a good thing, then the occasional mostly-male panel is not only OK or tolerable, but a good thing.  It really is pretty simple, and I would respectfully suggest that the people who react so angrily to that entirely logical line of argument are suffering from more than a touch of cognitive dissonance.

*  *  *

You may already have seen this, because Roseanna Cunningham linked to it earlier, but it's a jaw-dropping insight into the Kafkaesque antics of the UK immigration authorities.  If that's the way a young, white American woman can get treated, the mind boggles as to what must sometimes happen to people of other nationalities/ethnicities. (And yes, I know the American immigration authorities are even worse.)