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Polling: 2017 General Election, Council Elections and Independence


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2 minutes ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:
6 minutes ago, Gordon EF said:
I'd always prefer a minority government that needed the votes of at least one other party to get stuff through. Keeps them on their toes, keeps them in check and encourages compromise when it's required.

In normal circumstances I can understand that - I just think that for this election it is important that they get the majority to deny the Tories any get out.

Oh yeah. I just mean generally. SNP majority until independence is fine.

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To borrow a terrible phrase from the US elections, what's the path to victory for any non-SNP party?  It's just not really conceived possible.  It would take a turnaround almost unheard of for either Labour or the Tories to overtake the SNP and I don't think anyone really thinks they are going to join forces to run a coaltiion.  The only possible non-SNP coaltion would be Labour, LIb Dem and Greens but I doubt the Greens would join, especially given the announcement today that all their candidates would back a new independence referendum.

Really you'd have to rely on one of Labour or the Tories collapsing, their votes shifting to the other and forming a coaltion with the Lib Dems.  That seems almost impossible.

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3 minutes ago, ICTChris said:

To borrow a terrible phrase from the US elections, what's the path to victory for any non-SNP party?  It's just not really conceived possible.  It would take a turnaround almost unheard of for either Labour or the Tories to overtake the SNP and I don't think anyone really thinks they are going to join forces to run a coaltiion.  The only possible non-SNP coaltion would be Labour, LIb Dem and Greens but I doubt the Greens would join, especially given the announcement today that all their candidates would back a new independence referendum.

Really you'd have to rely on one of Labour or the Tories collapsing, their votes shifting to the other and forming a coaltion with the Lib Dems.  That seems almost impossible.

Yeah. There's no realistic, conceivable way that works unless the SNP vote crumbles a bit and isn't picked up by the Greens, leading to SNP + Greens not being a majority and some ghastly grand unionist coalition forming.

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1 minute ago, Gordon EF said:

Yeah. There's no realistic, conceivable way that works unless the SNP vote crumbles a bit and isn't picked up by the Greens, leading to SNP + Greens not being a majority and some ghastly grand unionist coalition forming.

Even then, surely even Sir Keith isn’t stupid enough to not realise how badly being in coalition with the Tories up here would go down with Labour voters down south? Surely there’s no fucking danger he, or any other Labour leader, could let it happen for fear of the backlash. 

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1 minute ago, oneteaminglasgow said:

Even then, surely even Sir Keith isn’t stupid enough to not realise how badly being in coalition with the Tories up here would go down with Labour voters down south? Surely there’s no fucking danger he, or any other Labour leader, could let it happen for fear of the backlash. 

Yeah, I don't think it would. I just mean it's probably the only option where the numbers even could work.

Edited by Gordon EF
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No, the alternative to an SNP majority is an SNP minority government, which requires compromise to get policies though and therefore allows the SNP to get through most of the good stuff (including any bill for an independence referendum) but prevents the worst stuff (eg OBFA, the exams postcode lottery).

The fact that the Tories are a bunch of c***s doesn't mean the SNP get a free pass every single time.
Only if pro independence parties have a majority.
Tories,Labour and the Libdems have shown little evidence in being willing to compromise.
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3 minutes ago, jakedee said:

Only if pro independence parties have a majority.
Tories,Labour and the Libdems have shown little evidence in being willing to compromise.


Sorry, I thought that was implied. If the SNP don't win a minority then the Greens should almost certainly have enough seats to make it a pro-independence majority.

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1 hour ago, ICTChris said:

To borrow a terrible phrase from the US elections, what's the path to victory for any non-SNP party?  It's just not really conceived possible.  It would take a turnaround almost unheard of for either Labour or the Tories to overtake the SNP and I don't think anyone really thinks they are going to join forces to run a coaltiion.  The only possible non-SNP coaltion would be Labour, LIb Dem and Greens but I doubt the Greens would join, especially given the announcement today that all their candidates would back a new independence referendum.

Really you'd have to rely on one of Labour or the Tories collapsing, their votes shifting to the other and forming a coaltion with the Lib Dems.  That seems almost impossible.

Do you mean in this election, or in the longer term? If you just mean this election then yes, the worst realistic case is an SNP minority with the Greens not being enough on their own to get it over the line. I thought it was interesting that the SNP made a deal on the budget with the Lib Dems and got both them and the Greens to vote for it. It's pretty much impossible to see the SNP "losing" the election in any sense, no matter what happens from here.

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Just thinking back to when the Scottish Parliament was reconvened and it was considered almost impossible for Labour not to be part of the Scottish Executive, not to mention that the Nationalists would never be able to obtain a majority.

What a time to be alive.

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1 hour ago, BFTD said:

Just thinking back to when the Scottish Parliament was reconvened and it was considered almost impossible for Labour not to be part of the Scottish Executive, not to mention that the Nationalists would never be able to obtain a majority.

What a time to be alive.

I wrote my dissertation on the Committee system of the Scottish parliament and one of the main ideas behind it was that it would be bipartisan and would be able to hold the Executive, as it was then, to account across party lines. This is not going so well.

I’m pretty sure that every party currently represented in the Parliament has voted with the SNP to get a budget through at some point. There certainly isn’t a bipartisan atmosphere in the Parliament now though, as far as I can see, and there definitely isn’t one within Scottish politics as a whole.

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It's funny how SNP supporters always bang on about how independence is bigger than the party apart from at election time.


The problem is that while many people in Scotland think an SNP minority with the Greens as an Indy Majority is a good thing for the very reasons you state (keeps the SNP in check from free reign) Westminster pretty much ignores the existence of the Scottish Greens as a pro Independence Party and anything less than an SNP majority will be used to justify forcing us to stay in the Union. When they developed the Holyrood system to basically prevent an SNP majority so the Unionists could block them they didn’t foresee a pro independence Green Party propping them up.

Even the Media up here pretty much ignores the Greens and will put 3 Unionists against 1 Nationalist (SNP) at every debate despite the Greens being far more relevant than the Lib Dems up here. Minority governments are a good thing but it’ll be used by the Unionists to deny a referendum, Boris and his chums won’t recognise an Indy majority just a failure of the SNP to gain a majority.
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The problem is that while many people in Scotland think an SNP minority with the Greens as an Indy Majority is a good thing for the very reasons you state (keeps the SNP in check from free reign) Westminster pretty much ignores the existence of the Scottish Greens as a pro Independence Party and anything less than an SNP majority will be used to justify forcing us to stay in the Union. When they developed the Holyrood system to basically prevent an SNP majority so the Unionists could block them they didn’t foresee a pro independence Green Party propping them up.

Even the Media up here pretty much ignores the Greens and will put 3 Unionists against 1 Nationalist (SNP) at every debate despite the Greens being far more relevant than the Lib Dems up here. Minority governments are a good thing but it’ll be used by the Unionists to deny a referendum, Boris and his chums won’t recognise a Indy majority just a failure of the SNP to gain a majority.
Well it's up to the current government to ram that narrative home
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Well it's up to the current government to ram that narrative home


Really they shouldn’t have to as Westminster should recognise that the SNP/Greens is every bit as Indy and the SNP alone. However we know they’ll use every dirty trick to prevent a referendum. Annoys me how ignored the Greens are by the media but adding them would acknowledge they make up a pro independence majority and prevent a 3 against 1 argument.
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9 minutes ago, San Starko Rover said:

 


The problem is that while many people in Scotland think an SNP minority with the Greens as an Indy Majority is a good thing for the very reasons you state (keeps the SNP in check from free reign) Westminster pretty much ignores the existence of the Scottish Greens as a pro Independence Party and anything less than an SNP majority will be used to justify forcing us to stay in the Union. When they developed the Holyrood system to basically prevent an SNP majority so the Unionists could block them they didn’t foresee a pro independence Green Party propping them up.

Even the Media up here pretty much ignores the Greens and will put 3 Unionists against 1 Nationalist (SNP) at every debate despite the Greens being far more relevant than the Lib Dems up here. Minority governments are a good thing but it’ll be used by the Unionists to deny a referendum, Boris and his chums won’t recognise a Indy majority just a failure of the SNP to gain a majority.

 

On that point. Do you think the greens overtaking labour, would make more of an impact on the media than an SNP majority?

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On that point. Do you think the greens overtaking labour, would make more of an impact on the media than an SNP majority?


No I think even if Labour and the Lib Dems had less seats than the Greens they’d still get more recognition than the Greens by the media. They’d use some pish reason about being bigger UK wide like when they ignore the SNP down south despite being the 3rd party yet include the Lib Dems.
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3 hours ago, San Starko Rover said:

 


No I think even if Labour and the Lib Dems had less seats than the Greens they’d still get more recognition than the Greens by the media. They’d use some pish reason about being bigger UK wide like when they ignore the SNP down south despite being the 3rd party yet include the Lib Dems.

 

This is so true. The Lib Dems get massively more coverage in Scotland than the Greens despite them getting very similar vote shares and polling figures for about a decade. The justification given - seriously - is that the Lib Dems have MPs. So long as they get their vote out in Orkney & Shetland, St Andrew's and Corstorphine they're somehow considered relevant, despite the fact that they can't even keep a deposit across almost the entire country, because of Westminster's daft FPTP system. 

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If the SNP legislate for another indyref and it passes with a parliamentary majority but they can't convey to the media that that represents a majority of pro-independence MSPs in the parliament then they deserve to get dingied by Boris Johnson and not taken seriously. 

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The SNP try to convey many things through the media.

However most of the print media - and their online versions - ain't interested due to their unionist leaning owners so will & do straight up refuse to print press releases from SNP policitians & SNP led council administrations.

The BBC don't even pretend to hide their bias against the SNP at this point, Murdoch's Sky ain't much better & to a slightly lesser extent STV.

It's why social media is such a big tool for the party as the press in general are rabidly anti-SNP & anti-Indy.

Thankfully the influence of the MSM is on the wane.

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4 hours ago, cdisaaccie said:

The SNP try to convey many things through the media.

However most of the print media - and their online versions - ain't interested due to their unionist leaning owners so will & do straight up refuse to print press releases from SNP policitians & SNP led council administrations.

The BBC don't even pretend to hide their bias against the SNP at this point, Murdoch's Sky ain't much better & to a slightly lesser extent STV.

It's why social media is such a big tool for the party as the press in general are rabidly anti-SNP & anti-Indy.

Thankfully the influence of the MSM is on the wane.

Very true, however, the MSM sets the agenda and if a story gets traction then it is un-stoppable.  Many journalists have become incredibly lazy and will no longer go out and hunt down their own stories they will leave that to the likes of the Daily Mail and Daily Express and they will sheepishly follow on their coat-tails. These Holyrood and Hamilton Inquries have been classic examples - compare and contrast with Boris recently where he was proven by a High Court udge to have broken the law regarding Covid-19 contracts - hardly a peep and no calls that he should resign

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