Almost a Third of No Voters will Now Vote Yes – and the Highest Ever Poll Predicts Scottish Independence

Two breaking new poll results confirm the trend for a huge swing to Yes ahead of 2021 Holyrood elections.

First a new poll by Survation on behalf of Progress Scotland found that 64% of respondents with a view believe Scotland would vote YES if a referendum were held now. The result is the highest-ever rating for the ‘wisdom of the crowd’ question, which tests the expectations of the public about a likely YES result.

Perhaps more significantly the No vote has effectively collapsed.

The Survation poll of 2,093 respondents found that almost one third of 2014 NO voters would now vote YES. Nearly twice as many NO voters have moved to YES than have in the opposite direction.

Progress Scotland Director Angus Robertson said:
“This poll shows how much opinion is changing in Scotland towards Scottish independence. After a series of sustained opinion poll findings indicating majority support for independence, this large poll demonstrates the scale of the momentum and the factors which are driving people from NO to YES. It is extremely striking that the highest-ever percentage of voters in Scotland now believe that there would be a YES victory if a referendum were held tomorrow and that one third of 2014 NO voters have changed their minds to YES or are not sure how they would vote.”
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Independence Vote Expectations
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Regardless of your own views on Scottish independence, if a referendum were held now, what do you think the outcome of the referendum would be?

Base: All (2,093)

%
Scotland would vote ‘Yes’ to independence
55
Scotland would vote ‘No’ to independence
30
Don’t know
14
Excluding Don’t Knows: Scotland would vote Yes: 64% No: 36%
*
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Same Views/Changing Views on independence 
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Thinking back to how you voted in the referendum September 2014 and your views now, which of the following statements best describes what you think?

Base: All (2,093)

%
My views are the same as in 2014 and I would vote the same way in another referendum
73
My views have changed, and I would vote the other way in another referendum
11
My views have changed a bit, and I am now not sure how I would vote
15
I would not vote in another referendum
1
According to the data-tables 32% of 2014 NO voters have changed their views and they would vote the other way, or their views have changed a bit and are now not sure how they would vote. This is the same for 17% of 2014 YES voters.
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Secondly Ballot Box Scotland reports ComRes polling which suggests a huge pro-independence majority of 25 seats.
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Based on a shift since August the poll would result in SNP – 66 (-1 / +3) Conservative – 25 (-1 / -6) Labour – 22 (+4 / -2) Green – 11 (+1 / +5) Lib Dem – 5 (-3 / nc).
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This would mean five new Green MSPs dominating the pro-indy regional vote. There is no showing for the SSP, Brexit Party, UKIP, or any of the new independence parties. It seems inconceivable that these are a viable project at this stage. If the polls were to come true at election time this would surely mean a (short-lived) career end for Richard Leonard and Douglas Ross, amongst others.
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Comments (14)

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  1. Me Bungo Pony says:

    Having spent time on other pro-indy sites, I have discovered that the more independence looks likely, the worse it is for the cause because …. reasons. Therefore I can only conclude this poll is the worst yet for independence.

    1. Yes indeed these polls will be taken by some to be grace and dire. For some the real task at hand is to destroy and re-build the SNP and the YES movement within the next three months and in ding so to retain these polling advantages

  2. Frank says:

    At a time when support for independence is increasing, I’m increasingly worried that the vote is going to split next year. Take the curious case of The Alliance for independence, now rebranded as Action for Indy. The Alliance says it wants unity and has made reasoned arguments as to why a second vote is ‘wasted’. However, the Greens and the SSP will field candidates next year, which means that there will be no unity on the list vote. In fact, by standing in the elections, the Alliance is only adding to the disunity. The only party in so-called ‘Alliance’ is Solidarity, which is not a credible political party but rather a handful of people linked to Tommy Sheridan and a few ex-SNP people that no one has heard of. The wider movement needs to put pressure on this group to stop them splitting the vote.

    1. Lorna Campbell says:

      Frank: you are right that splitting the vote could be disastrous. However, had the SNP actually acted on independence, none of this would have happened. That is the stark truth. No, it had to shilly and shally, dither and foot-drag for six years between 2014 and 2020, basically achieving zilch in the way of independence. It is the fundamental reason why we have these divisions now.

      Not only that, but careerists, entryists, devolutionists and sundry other interest groups and lobbies attached themselves like leeches to the SNP body politic and have slowly sucked the lifeblood out of it. Only now are we beginning to see a backlash against the take-over of the party by people, basically, who do not give a toss about independence. That is the harsh, factual truth, totally borne out by what is happening now.

      The Labour Party was the lesson that the SNP did not learn, or learn soon enough. Many of those who migrated from Labour – not all by any means – in Scotland brought their Militant and other ‘woke’ agendas with them. Added to them, ambitious careerists and entryists, desperate to make their mark, crowded out the market, and independistas were trampled underfoot in the surge for the best jobs, salaries and opportunities that a party on the up and up could provide. Anyone who is surprised at what has happened has been asleep for six years.

      It started with one of the worst blunders ever made by any party when it decided that the 2014 referendum loss was a reason to hand the party over to the NO voters. I am no oracle – more a Cassandra, destined never to be believed – but I have been saying since 2014: do not go for a second PRE independence referendum because all you will do is hand the field to your opponents, allow them to call the tune. I might be very wrong, and maybe I’m not even a Cassandra, but that Trojan Horse still looms large.

      If a PRE independence referendum was in any way, shape or form, legally necessary, I could forgive the mess we are in now, but it never was. Ergo, because the indigenous Scots voted 53.7% to 47.3% FOR independence, that was the indication that a different, but equally democratic and legal, route had to be sought if the party was not to be suborned with no option for independistas but to report to the Irish solution, which no one, surely wants?

      Now, before anyone screams, racist, ‘indigenous people’ is the phrase used by the UN to discourage colonial interference in the independence bid of a country or part of a country – that is, if an independence bid his stifled/thwarted/frustrated by a demographic that is not indigenous to the country in question, but is populated by those from either the state from which said country wishes to escape, or if it is populated by people totally unconnected to the country seeking its independence except by being present in that country, it cannot be allowed to carry the day. That is precisely what happened in Scotland, in 2014, when the rUK majority NO vote and the EU majority NO vote collaborated with the indigenous Scottish Unionist NO vote to scupper independence.

      It makes no difference that they had the vote, rightly, in my opinion, as they were, apart from those merely ‘passing through’, and of whom there were a number in 2014, settled in Scotland: the UN self-determination chapter rests on the right of any nation to seek its independence lawfully. The 2014 NO vote should have been put in its place immediately, by a declaration from the Scottish government that it would be seeking an alternative route to independence in the face of such a flagrant breach of the UN Charter.

      It did not then, or at any time since then, actually make any kind of stand against this breach of the UN Charter, or any breach of the Treaty of Union, and only the mildest of protests at the undemocratic Brexit and breaching of the Scotland Act, and it was from this point that the rest of the downhill trajectory occurred, even though the SNP did extremely well, and still does, in elections. It also allowed for six years in which the colonising of the party of independence by those less than attached to independence, occurred, and for the party to become a mere vehicle for the ambitions of people with agendas that precluded independence. That should now be obvious to anyone with an interest in the revival of the SNP as the party of independence. It is going to take a massive battle now to reclaim the soul of the party.

      1. Lorna when you write “because the indigenous Scots voted 53.7% to 47.3% FOR independence”, this is indeed, as you know, racist.

        You posts are not just legally and politically confused and incoherent they are regularly borderline racist.

        I have tolerated this for some time but consider yourself on a warning. This tone may be tolerated on some of the sites you frequent but it isn’t here.

        Desist or be removed.

        Final warning.

        1. Bill says:

          Dear Editor, your ‘yellow card’ warning to Lorna has me confused. She gave an explicit rationale for her use of the term ‘indigenous’. If this is deemed racist do I take it that the UN is racist, or the use of their definitions is racist? I have no wish to put petrol on a fire that might well be going too well anyway. However I believe that one has to distinguish truth in these matters. Analysis of the origin of those voting is necessary in order to properly tailor convincing arguments to various sectors and thus enhance the debate.

          Bill

        2. Lorna Campbell says:

          Mike Small: I specifically used the term in line with the UN Charter. Are you accusing the UN of racism? Or the British government for signing up to the UN Charter and the responsibilities it places upon all of us not to cause harm, cultural political, social or economic, to others? Is it not racism to thwart the democratic and human right of a people to follow their path to independence if they choose?

          That is absolutely against the whole tenet of the UN Charter’s self-determination chapter and the right to throw off colonialism and the attitudes that inform colonialism. You do not need to remove me from your website, Mr Small. I will remove myself. I never thought that my country would descend into this morass of undemocratic, anti human rights refusal to acknowledge free speech, but we are living in a tyranny of minority views and groups who use big money, big muscle (not theirs) and other props to achieve their ends. That you can either not see that or refuse to acknowledge it, and tremble before it, is testament to the power of minority tyranny.

          I am neither inciting racism nor advocating it. I have also specifically added that I do not, personally, advocate removal of anyone’s rights, and that, if you live in Scotland in a way that makes you a citizen, you have, unconditionally, the right to vote. All rights are balanced by obligations and responsibilities, and thy invoke certain ways of dealing with problems that are not in themselves, oppressive. Scotland’s situation, thanks to an ‘alliance’ in 2014 of three minority interests to thwart Scottish independence, is now one of oppression.

          I must assume that you are either wilfully blind to what is happening to the Scots, as a people, as a nation, or you choose to ignore it. You have issued similar threats on the issue of trans rights versus women’s rights, castigating women for standing up for their rights under the 2010 Equality Act, and on the issue of cultural racism and colonialism, stifling the debates. I am sorry if the truth does not sit well with their, and your, stance and this is your website and blog, so I will withdraw in despair that Scotland will ever be allowed to stand up for herself in the face of inverted racism. I will leave you with this thought to ponder: why is it not racist to be anti Scottish? Thank you for your indulgence, and I apologize for any, inadvertent offence I have caused, but I will never apologize for telling the truth, as I see it. I will not turn my face away from the terrible damage that is being done to Scotland because it will not call out the racism that it faces every single day, because it will not stand up for itself. I do believe that this is going to end very badly precisely because we refuse to face up to the tyrannical form of minority racism that exists in this country, the blatant and horrendous misogyny that exists within the tarns movement and the wilfully blind refusal to acknowledge the very real cultural and minority colonialism that is preventing our proper growth as a free nation in the 21st century. If you don’t publish this reply, I will take that as an admission that freedom is dead in Scotland on so many levels.

          1. Bill says:

            Lorna, please do not remove yourself. That path of no resistance will deprive the rest of us of a thoughtful, insightful person who has much to contribute to the debate on independence. Like you I despair of the SNP government doing little to move the case forward. As I have said on this and other places, we do not want a Westminster blessed referendum on independence, but independence itself.(and all the good and bad that will come with it). To that end this country needs all of the people of courage and good heart, like yourself, to stay and keep the fight going – and to acknowledge, as you did, that all who choose to live their lives in Scotland need to be part of the democracy of the country- and to further acknowledge that the views of the indigenous population may well differ from others, and both must be addressed.

            Please do not go, stay, as we shall need friends on the day of battle

            Bill

      2. Me Bungo Pony says:

        Lorna Campbell wrote;
        “However, had the SNP actually acted on independence, none of this would have happened. That is the stark truth. No, it had to shilly and shally, dither and foot-drag for six years between 2014 and 2020, basically achieving zilch in the way of independence”.
        There has been no reasonable possibility of any move towards independence since 2014 succeeding. The SNP exist to actually achieve independence, not to weary the electorate by subjecting the country to a series of pointless referendums they have no chance of winning just to keep a bunch of smug malcontents, whose tin foil hats have been getting too tight, happy,

        It has only been six years since 2014. It was seven years into Alex Salmond’s tenure before indyref1 took place, and that was foisted on him by Westminster. He hadn’t been looking to go for it until 2016 …. at the earliest. Patience is a virtue.

        1. Lorna Campbell says:

          Bungo: no, it has been the insistence on a second PRE independence referendum that has been the problem. Scotland has several other options at its disposal. The Treaty, for example, is one route. It is just far too spineless to contemplate them or to do what it will take to implement them. That would mean facing up to Westminster. So, we will disappear in a cloud of vicious and malign policies that are anti Scottish at their heart, but let’s just wait long enough for that to be achieved, shall we? We don’t want to upset anyone with the truth, even if we perish in the process.

          The failure of 2014 should not have been the end of the line because that, in itself, was a contravention of international law. Read the UN Charter. Nobody, but nobody, has the right to prevent a nation from achieving its independence – or, in our case, re-achieving it. So many appear to have forgotten that we were once one of the oldest, independent sovereign states in Northern Europe. I would go so far as to say that, had we achieved our independence in 2014, we would have been dealing a lot better with Covid, and we would have been in a position to borrow on our own behalf. What happened on September 18, 2014, was a crime against democracy, a contravention of international law and a blight forever on the spineless, downtrodden nation that we call Scotland. Oh, not the well-heeled and th self-interested; they always survive. The poorest in our communities, the just-getting-by people. They will suffer as you wait for the comfortable, Tory, Tory Lite and Yellow Tory middle-class to crack. They won’t crack, but they will vote NO again.

          1. Me Bungo Pony says:

            I will be glad of any process that delivers independence Lorna, so long as the people of Scotland want it. Foisting independence on an unwilling population would make us little better than the Tories. Only now are a majority of the population clearly falling in behind independence. In my opinion, any attempt to force the issue before now would have done more harm than good.

            PS The Treaty was in tatters within a few years of the Union, and yet it remained in place. Citing an ancient broken treaty is unlikely to cut the mustard in any court. The time to do that was in the 18th century, not the 21st. If there was any mileage in it do you not think M&s Cherry would have been on the case some time ago?

  3. James Mills says:

    I can well understand the reasons for former ‘No’voters switching to ‘Yes’ – failure of The Vow , more Tory Governments that we did not vote for , Boris Johnson , Richard Leonard etc… What confounds me is the alleged movement of ‘Yes’ voters to ‘No’ !

    What do they see that is so different now from 2014 in how we are treated by Westminster that they feel comforted enough to remain in their ‘caring ‘ hands ?

    1. Bill says:

      Could it be the outpourings of hate by less than pretty Patel? Has certainly caused problems for immigration lawyers and for all deemed as ‘foreign”. The people who appeared in George Square to celebrate the 2014 victory certainly left much to be desired and did not seem to me to be tolerant peace loving and the type to welcome immigrants. There certainly appears to be the development of a Little Englander movement down south that may have an appeal to the people who may be a little xenophobic

      Bill

  4. Mark Cheevers says:

    The latest poll findings by Bella Caledonia as regards a referendum are very encouraging if the number stay the same or probably grow it seems the SNP hold are on the political high ground. The question now is timing when should they ask for a referendum? chances are it will be refused if refused do they have any legal means to repeal that decision? It not could they declare a UDI? The only problem the SNP may have is impatience amongst its supporters regards a poll considering Westminister will stall as much as it can. No Prime Minister wants to be the one to break up Britain the suggestion of a UDI is drastic but when it comes to Westminister it is best not to be reliant on their word as Ireland knows very well.

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