[SCOT goes POP!] YouGov MRP projection puts SNP on 25 seats, two of which would be gains from the Tories

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YouGov MRP projection puts SNP on 25 seats, two of which would be gains from the Tories

Before we start this blogpost, a reminder that the Scot Goes Pop opinion poll fundraiser urgently needs a boost - let's not leave it in limbo for months.  It's important that not all Scottish opinion polling is commissioned by anti-independence clients - we need to make sure that occasionally questions are asked that Yes supporters want asked.  The fundraiser page is HERE and details of how to donate directly by Paypal can be found at the bottom of this post.

For the uninitiated, part of the significance of this new poll being an MRP seats projection poll, rather than a conventional YouGov poll, is that YouGov's MRP projection was far more accurate in 2017 than its conventional polling - it correctly pointed to a hung parliament rather than a Tory majority.  It also picked up on the likelihood of substantial SNP losses in that election but underestimated their scale, which means that today's projection that the SNP will lose their seats majority in Scotland should be taken as more than just a vague warning.

YouGov seats projection:

Labour 385 (+183)

Conservatives 169 (-196)

Liberal Democrats 48 (+37)

SNP 25 (-23)

In spite of suffering heavy losses to Labour, the SNP would gain Alister Jack's seat from the Tories, and they would also remove Tory representation in the Moray area .Admittedly that's technically counted as a notional SNP hold due to boundary changes, but in the real world it would leave the Scottish Tories two seats down.  (West Aberdeenshire & Kincardine, incidentally, would be an SNP gain, but that's offset by a new neighbouring Tory seat on the revised boundaries.) So as yesterday's blogpost suggested, the SNP certainly aren't wasting their time in targetting tactical votes from Labour supporters in the six Tory-held seats.

The Western Isles is already projected as a Labour gain, which demonstrates that the absolute priority must be that an agreement is reached to allow Angus MacNeil, the only pro-indy candidate with a chance of winning the constituency, a free run without an SNP challenger splitting the vote.  Similarly, the two Alba-held seats are forecast as Labour gains, and it would help enormously if there was no split pro-indy vote in those seats.

It's important to stress that an MRP poll is the exact same as a conventional poll in one key respect - it's a snapshot not a prediction.  It doesn't take into account the effect of the official campaign period which will be swamped by London-based media coverage of the Labour v Tory horserace, and will thus be the real period of danger for the SNP.  My fear is that an absurdly complacent SNP leadership could look at these numbers and think "you know what, we can live with 25, we'd still be major players", not realising that a steady-as-she-goes approach could be a recipe for something close to a total wipeout.  I firmly believe that in a worst case scenario, the SNP could lose all but a couple of their seats, and that the worst case scenario is also a lot more probable than most people believe.

Generally speaking, you'd think that a projection showing that a Tory government is on course for a heavy defeat to Labour would lead to calls for the Tories to move into the centre ground where elections are usually won.  Rather comically, though, the opposite is happening in this case because the poll was commissioned by Tory donors with an anti-Sunak agenda, and they've clearly passed the results to the Telegraph on condition that they can make their case that Sunak either needs to go or move to a hard-right policy agenda.  OK, they can argue that such a course of action might win crucial votes back from Reform UK, or even dissuade Reform UK from putting up candidates in key seats - but the danger is throwing the baby out with the bathwater and losing more moderate voters to Labour and the Lib Dems in the process.

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Source: YouGov MRP projection puts SNP on 25 seats, two of which would be gains from the Tories