The pattern of actual credible (not you, FindOutNow) polling continues to alternate between Survation and Norstat. This month it’s the latter’s turn (link to tables), as part of their usual partnership with the Sunday Times (link to original writeup). If someone could commission a YouGov, Savanta, Ipsos, that’d be a great help to the picture of what’s going on!
The previous Norstat covered the 4th – 6th of December 2024. Changes are shown as (vs that poll / vs last election).
Regional Vote
As has so often been the case lately, there isn’t actually a lot of movement on this front: basically everything is within margin of error. It’s therefore more a general confirmation of current vibes rather than anything new in and of itself. The SNP are down a couple of points but that still fits within their general stabilisation at the moment, whereas they’d been slipping further into the 20’s a few months ago.
Labour are still doing very poorly despite having won big last year, with the loss of another point here taking them below their 2021 result, and their worst share on this question of any BBS-tracked poll since November 2021. The Conservatives are likewise down marginally on the last poll, but mid-teens qualifies as “good” for them at the moment. Balancing those movements out both Reform and the Lib Dems are up a point, and the Greens somewhat spoil a neat “decrements of 2% down the list of parties” pattern by gaining two points to take them back (barely) into double digits.
Note that Norstat continue to find Alba higher than Survation do, but that even so they are down very slightly since December. That is, of course, also margin of error, but it does add to the sense that FindOutNow’s figures are massively inflated.
Constituency Vote
Very slightly more movement over on the constituency question, if only for one party. The SNP are again down two points here, but given Labour are losing a full 3% they remain well ahead. This is again the worst Labour have polled since that same November 2021 Ipsos, emphasising the depth of the malaise afflicting the party at the moment. Everyone else gains at least one point, with Reform gaining two, putting them close to overtaking the Conservatives.
This trend is worth watching because if Reform follow through on their intention to contest constituencies, they could absolutely shatter Conservative chances in the North East, despite the SNP’s problems. They’ll also, obviously, be eating enormously into Labour’s share which could make the difference in urban areas.
Seat Projection
Projecting that into seats might give us something like this:
Please see this page for how projections work and important caveats.
The SNP’s slight dip in share is reflected by projecting to a couple less seats compared to the previous poll, but even with Alba dropping back out of the model the Green recovery is a net gain of one for the Pro-Independence bloc, leading 68 to 61 over the combined Pro-Union haul. Within the latter there’s a slight shift in favour of the Lib Dems and Reform, with corresponding losses for the Conservatives and Labour. For the latter this is the worst seat projection I’ve given them since, as you might guess from the commentary earlier, November 2021.
I often say I’m not in the business of offering advice to parties, but just on the off chance anyone in Scottish Labour is actually paying attention: when you capitulate to your opponent’s viewpoints, you don’t regain voters from them, you suggest to voters they were right all along and they then decide to vote for the original flavour. You can swing as hard right as you like, you can appallingly and disgracefully keep throwing Scotland’s LGBT community under the bus as Anas Sarwar and Jackie Baillie did this week, and it won’t help you one bit. Try growing a spine and actually standing for some basic principles.
Possible Majorities
Note: these majorities relate simply to passing a vote in the Scottish Parliament. They do not imply the formation of a full coalition government.
- Traffic Light: Labour, Lib Dem and Green
- Independence Bloc: SNP, Green and Alba
- Grand Coalition: SNP and Labour
- Union Bloc: Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem and Reform UK
I think the most eye-popping bit of this poll is in this question. Not only are Labour sitting on half the share they achieved in July, but at just 1% ahead of Reform UK they are in statistical terms tied for second. It’s a matter of time before we see a Scottish poll that places Reform in second and Labour back in third. All hell will break loose in the discourse when that happens. Again, not usually in the business of giving advice, but perhaps Labour might want to consider doing some meaningful good in government, and that might help them? Just a thought!
In terms of the other parties, the SNP break with the other two questions with a very small (and thus within margin of error) single-point uptick here, whilst the Conservatives are down by the same amount. As with the Holyrood questions, the Lib Dems are also up a couple of points, putting them back within touching distance of fourth place.
The previous Norstat had a rather remarkable Independence lead which was a stark reminder that simply beating the SNP in one (1) election wasn’t the fatal blow to Independence some naively believed it would be. However, I also noted it was entirely possible it was a bit of an outlier. Although Independence remains in a very narrow lead on the headline figures here, after excluding Don’t Knows it snaps back to a straight tie with the Union.
Hypotheticals
As ever, the last little bit of analysis concerns those hypothetical and more proportional voting systems that BBS likes to play about with. The use of pure FPTP at Westminster is an affront to democracy, and though Holyrood fares far better, AMS is still deeply imperfect. The examples here simply transpose the poll findings onto more proportional voting systems – the reality is that different systems would of course result in different voter behaviour.
Scandinavian Style Westminster
Although the Westminster figures would be near-wipeout again for Labour under First Past the Post, they merely tie in seats with Reform in a wholly proportional model. That means having barely more than half the seats the SNP would, and only a couple more than the Conservatives.
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