Apologies for the slight delay in getting this post up – I was writing an article for The National about the Ashcroft poll, which you can read HERE. But here are the rather wonderful figures that you’ve probably already seen…
Should Scotland be an independent country?
Yes 52%
No 48%
It’s not possible to give percentage changes from the last comparable poll, because Ashcroft hasn’t been polling on independence in recent years. That means, strictly speaking, that we shouldn’t talk about “Yes moving into the lead”, because it’s conceivable that previous Ashcroft polls (if they had existed) would also have shown a Yes lead. However, even the most Yes-friendly pollsters had No consistently in the lead last year, so it does seem overwhelmingly likely that the Ashcroft methodology would have shown a No lead giving way to a Yes lead at some point – but what we don’t know is exactly when that would have happened. Is the Yes breakthrough a direct consequence of Boris Johnson becoming Prime Minister? We’ll only find out for sure if Panelbase (the only firm to have polled fairly regularly on independence this year) shows a Yes lead in their next poll.
Before I proceed any further, I’d just like to observe again that Mike Smithson, known and loved to thousands of East Dunbartonshire residents as a keen letter-writing impartial Lib Dem election expert, is utterly unspoofable. Here we have a poll that shows a majority in favour of independence for the first time in two years, that shows a majority want a second independence referendum by 2021, and that shows Nicola Sturgeon is comfortably the most popular leading politician in Scotland, well ahead of Ruth Davidson and Jo Swinson. And yet what is Smithson’s choice of headline? “Lord Ashcroft poll has Swinson beating Johnson, Corbyn and Farage in Scotland.” Technically true, Mike, but I’d gently suggest to you that there’s a bigger picture here that you might be missing through those Lib Dem goggles of yours.
In fact, a direct comparison between the personal ratings of Nicola Sturgeon and Jo Swinson makes for pretty depressing reading for the new Lib Dem leader. Respondents were asked to give each politician a score between 0 and 100, with 0 being the worst possible figure and 100 the best. In spite of the hatred (I don’t think that’s too strong a word) that some unionists feel towards Ms Sturgeon, and in spite of the fact that Ms Swinson is significantly less well-known than Ms Sturgeon, the 30% of voters who gave Ms Swinson a basement rating of between 0 and 10 is virtually identical to the 34% who did the same for Ms Sturgeon. Meanwhile, a measly 4% gave Ms Swinson a high rating of between 81 and 100, compared to a very substantial 24% who did so for Ms Sturgeon.
Although it’s true that Ms Swinson’s average rating of 31 (that’s 31 out of 100, remember!) is higher than that of deeply unpopular politicians such as Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn, it’s not that much higher in the overall scheme of things. She’s only seven points ahead of Mr Johnson on 24, and nine points ahead of Mr Corbyn on 22. That’s not really much to write home about.
More details and analysis to follow shortly…
