Will Scotland Leave the UK?

Originally Posted by jfman

Certainly, I look forward to Chris and his thoughts on the Scottish result.

A collapse in SNP votes - part turnout, part Labour up, Tories down and LDs narrowly down.

The proportional system* would save the SNP to some extent in Scottish elections but if they aren’t the largest party (and out of Government) it’d be unreasonable to expect a pro-independence argument to prevail on a single election victory at a later date.

It pushes the idea of a referendum into the mid-2030s and application of it a couple of years after that.

*There’s a potential for infighting over positions at the top of the regional lists too as ex-MPs and constituency MSPs on the brink seek refuge there.

You’re not going to get much cogent analysis from me on less than 6 hours sleep

The result is very bad for the SNP because it makes them stink of failure. Especially awkward for Honest John because last time he led the SNP they were not known for winning either. That puts them on the back foot when we get to the election that really matters for the independence campaign, which is Holyrood 2026. By that point, Labour might be showing either a few early triumphs or failure to improve much at all, and that will feed through to the Scottish general election. That said, two ferries are still not in service and the bill is going up. Access to GPs, dentists and operations on the NHS is dreadful (and it makes no odds if it’s slightly less awful than England … people understand that the service is devolved and they know who’s making the decisions that are failing to improve things). We still have no deposit return scheme, highly questionable performance of Scottish schools in international league tables … the list goes on.

Add to all that the fact that an intellectual belief in Scotland as an independent country is no longer coupled to any particular political party* and we might actually have arrived at where Sturgeon and Salmond said we would be if they lost in 2014: independence as a project parked for a generation.

*It’s worth noting that Alba got fewer votes in Scotland than Reform UK yesterday, though I don’t know how many Scottish seats each party ran in so it’s hard to know exactly how irrelevant Salmond still is.

Off-topic posts removed. This thread is for discussion of Scotland and its place in the UK. *All* election discussion not directly connected with the topic should be in the exit poll thread, here:

https://www.cableforum.uk/board/show...php?t=33712811

[jfman]

Although Alba are clearly crackpots, I do think it’s been a bad look for the SNP being more keen to cuddle up to the Greens and trans activists. Not convinced it plays well in greater Glasgow and Lanarkshire. An area I’d previously identified as “soft” - not lifelong independence voters in areas previously held Labour since the extension of the franchise to working men (sight exaggeration).

Originally Posted by jfman

Although Alba are clearly crackpots, I do think it’s been a bad look for the SNP being more keen to cuddle up to the Greens and trans activists. Not convinced it plays well in greater Glasgow and Lanarkshire. An area I’d previously identified as “soft” - not lifelong independence voters in areas previously held Labour since the extension of the franchise to working men (sight exaggeration).

The SNP’s problem was that the Yes movement tried to build a broad coalition in 2014, giving each client group a reason to vote for Indy without any overall convincing offer for how it would work without being eye-wateringly expensive and ball-breakingly difficult. They got arts and media luvvies, LGBTQWTAF activists, environmentalists, CND’ers, the hard Left and a whole lot else besides to come into the tent. Nicola’s bright idea was to try to make the SNP a similarly big tent post 2014. That was fatal and always liable to collapse under the weight of its own contradictions eventually. Even if the bulk of the socially progressive cranks are still on-board, the single biggest group, Scunnered of Shettleston, (who believed Yes, and then the SNP, when they were told ‘vote for us and you’ll be better off’) have finally woken up and smelled the Buckfast. Meanwhile the Tartan Tories who were appalled by the SNP’s lurch to the left have by no means all returned to the fold, as seats in and around the SNP’s traditional heartland in the northeast attest.

[Escapee]

Originally Posted by Chris

people understand that the service is devolved and they know who’s making the decisions that are failing to improve things).

If that's true, the average voter has a lot more common sense in Scotland than they do in Wales. The average voter in my area look blank if you explain that the devolved government have been responsible for the past 25 years and not Westminster.

Originally Posted by Escapee

If that's true, the average voter has a lot more common sense in Scotland than they do in Wales. The average voter in my area look blank if you explain that the devolved government have been responsible for the past 25 years and not Westminster.

Devolution in Wales was always a bonkers idea. England and Wales have had the same legal system and the same body of primary legislation since the 16th century. It works in Scotland because the union of 1707 deliberately preserved the concept of Scotland as a distinct legal entity within the united parliament of Great Britain. There has always been a political dimension to Scottishness that I never detected when I lived and worked in Wales, where Welshness was an entirely cultural/linguistic thing.

There was a whole raft of things devolved government could immediately take control of in Scotland and which people could immediately understand were now Holyrood’s domain because while they had previously been delivered by the Scottish Office, which was a Westminster government department led by UK government ministers, it was empowered by distinctly Scottish legislation.

[Hom3r]

going buy the fact the amount of scotts that deserted the SNP, I believe that the independence vote is dead and buried.

[Angua]

Originally Posted by Hom3r

going buy the fact the amount of scotts that deserted the SNP, I believe that the independence vote is dead and buried.

They did not turn to Alba either.

[nashville]

Thank the Lord the SNP lost almost all their votes, We have had enough,

[Stephen]

Originally Posted by nashville

Thank the Lord the SNP lost almost all their votes, We have had enough,

Well just have to wait and see what happens in the next local and Scottish government elections in two years. Will people still vote out the SNP, we can only hope.

[jfman]

While they lost the vast majority of their MPs they got 30% of the vote. The PR system for electing the Scottish Parliament would, if the result was replicated, translate to something like 40 seats. Labour would have something like 46.

Tactical voting won't be the same, that's not to say it can't happen. The move in Glasgow and Lanarkshire would be Labour with the first vote Lib Dem with the second. Very 1999. The first loser, for which I'm sure everyone has a special tiny violin, would probably be the Greens on the independence leaning side.