You would never guess it from the media but Lord Ashcroft’s latest major polling effort strips bare the entire lie about a Tory and Unionist bandwagon rolling in Scotland.
You would never guess it from Lord Ashcroft’s Tory agenda-driven report of the findings either. This tendentious nonsense ignores Scotland completely – indeed I do not think he even mentions the nation’s existence. No paid media journalist would ever dream of reading more than the executive summary of the report, and certainly would never comb through the data tables, which contain the actual information on which the report is just a gloss.
But the data tables break down the sample by “region”, of which Scotland is one, and thus give us a very great deal of information. The Ashcroft polls have a 10,000 sample and the Scottish sub-samples of over 900 are more than used for many standard Scotland only polls.
So here are the highlights:
It is indeed true that Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson is more popular than Nicola Sturgeon – but only in England.
Contrary to constant media propaganda, Nicola Sturgeon rates over 12% higher than Ruth Davidson. Invited to rate their performance from 0 to 100, Scottish voters gave Nicola Sturgeon a mean rating of 52.91% (Table 47) and Ruth Davidson 40.52% (Table 48). Despite Davidson being proclaimed by the media as the new Jim Murphy/Jesus Christ, including constant lying claims that she is the more popular.
But Ruth Davidson is very much more popular than Nicola Sturgeon – with the English. In every region of England, Davidson is widely preferred to Sturgeon.
There is no Tory Revival in Scotland.
Asked whether they would consider voting Conservative at the next Westminster election, on a scale of likelihood from 0 to 100, 65% of Scots voters answered 0-10 “there is no chance I would vote Conservative” compared to only 10% who answered 91 to 100 “I will definitely vote Conservative”. (Table 8)
The mean Tory score in Scotland on this scale was 23.84. This was narrowly behind Labour. (Table 9) Typically Ashcroft’s poll does not even ask about the SNP. But note this methodology gives a mean result that is higher than a party’s actual percentage vote: totaling the party mean scores for England gives you more than 100%. So Tory support in Scotland is running below 23.8% and below Labour.
Again this is completely contrary to the media propaganda that has been blasted constantly across Scotland.
Tory Britain is Totally Alien to Scots.
In answer to the question “Do you think Britain is on the right track, or heading in the wrong direction” Scots stated by a resounding 67% to 33% (excluding don’t knows) that Britain is heading in the wrong direction.
This compares to a clear majority in England that Britain is heading in the right direction. (Table 15).
Again contrary to constant media propaganda, Scots are much less obsessed than the English with controlling immigration. Only 28% of Scots named controlling immigration as one of the top three political issues, significantly lower than any region of England. (Table 19) A tiny 4% of Scots think immigration is the most important issue (Table 20).
But more revealing still is the ability to discern continued Scottish support for more left wing approaches to the economy. Here Ashcroft accidentally does us a favour by his exclusion of the SNP from the question.
Asked who would “have the best approach to growing the economy and creating jobs”, and not given a chance to answer SNP, Scots favour Labour over the Tories by a conclusive 46% to 36%. This compares to an equally strong preference for the Tories across England. (Table 25). Interestingly an extraordinary 15% of Scots plumped for the Lib Dems, presumably in reaction to no SNP choice being offered.
Again this is a devastating disproof of the media narrative that Scots have swallowed Torynomics. The Scottish preference for Labour over the Tories shows up in later tables on schools, the NHS, the environment etc.
Tory Scotland is a Myth the Media are Trying to Propagandise into Reality
As we gear up for the next referendum, I am cheered that the poll clears up the difference between empirical observation of the Scottish public and the picture portrayed by the media.
The media are lying.
The Blairite leadership of Scottish Labour betrayed their party by close collaboration with the Tories in Indyref1. As a result the party is in meltdown – but there is still a strong public sympathy for what might be described as real Labour values. This mantle has been taken up by the SNP.
But because the Scottish Labour Party as an organisation is a laughing stock, and because the Tories are highly hubristic and have convinced themselves of their own propaganda about their popularity, in Indyref2 we will face an open clash between Independence and Toryism. The Tories will no longer be lightly disguised behind Gordon Brown. Hard-faced anti-devolution unionism and City of London economics will be shoved down voters’ throats.
I have no doubt at all we will win this battle and finally achieve national independence again. If Ashcroft has the honesty to look at the message hidden in the unused data of his own poll results, the Tories realise it too. Which may explain their aversion to a referendum.
the MOAB into Afghanistan, it was a purely symbolic act….
Bevin
i think they are testing
As this latest post by Craig was about Scotland, this may be of interest to those who have an interest in the Lockerbie incident. http://www.lockerbietruth.com/2017/04/recalling-death-of-award-winning-film.html
I was watching President Vladimir Putin attending church on the night of Easter Saturday. It is amusing to see how fervent former Communist apparatchiks (and you can’t get much more apparatchik than a KGB officer, can you) have become fervent Christians. It’s almost enough to make one believe in the power of repentance 🙂
Scottish Tony Blair
“I should be very surprised if Assad is not the President of Syria, next year. But their are many variables involved, not, quite, the least of which is what the Syrian electorate wants.” (from Bevs)
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Yes, it would nice if the Syrian electorate were asked – preferably in elections with a variety of genuinely competing candidates and free media and with the secret police kept confined to barracks.
Why, it might even be that Candidate Assad Jnr would get fewer than 98% of the popular vote! 🙂
“Then there is the consideration that the job is not one that he [ie, “President” Assad Jnr ] will probably care to have once he has done his duty, saved his country from the scourges of wahhabism and America and brought peace back to his people.”
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I wonder if Physician Assad took as good care of his patients in London as “President” Assad of his fellow Syrians in Syria.
BTW, does anyone know whether Physician Assad worked for the National Health Service or was in private practice?
‘Someone’ took care of the ‘renditioned’?
‘In the words of former CIA agent Robert Baer: “If you want a serious interrogation, you send a prisoner to Jordan. If you want them to be tortured, you send them to Syria. If you want someone to disappear — never to see them again — you send them to Egypt.” ‘
https://www.aclu.org/other/fact-sheet-extraordinary-rendition
Ruth Davidson said to be contemplating walking out of Holyrood with her contingent if the SNP presses ahead with referendum plans.
Let’s just clarify all this.
Scotland voted to remain in the EU by a margin of 24%. David Cameron having previously rejected the call for a Scottish veto to brexit. The Tory government railroads brexit legislation through Westminster with minimum parliamentary scrutiny. The UK Supreme Court makes a mockery of the Sewell Convention. The Tories then decide it’s going to be hard brexit. They don’t even have the courtesy to tell the devolved administrations when Article 50 will be triggered. The SNP and the Greens deliver a majority vote at Holyrood for an independence referendum. May slaps down the Holyrood referendum vote without a even a discussion. The Tories make it clear that many of the devolved matters currently at Brussels will not be returned to the Scottish Parliament but will be retained at Westminster in complete contravention of existing devolution legislation. It transpires that the EU had drawn up plans to allow for Scotland to make a separate brexit deal but the Tories ignored it and didn’t involve the Scottish Government.
So after all that undemocratic behaviour Davidson thinks she can take the moral high ground and stage a walkout from parliament. All they’ll be doing is sending the people of Scotland another clear signal to follow on from the examples above that the Tory plan for Scotland is for more and more authoritarianism and less and less democracy and fairness.
“It transpires that the EU had drawn up plans to allow for Scotland to make a separate brexit deal”
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Source(s) ?
Andrew Learmonth of The National had a report two months ago that the newspaper had been shown European Parliament negotiating documents that detailed the readiness of Brussels to give Scotland a separate deal. As far as I know the EU did not deny the story.
The European Parliament is not the European Union.
And this mysterious “negotiating document” precedes by some time the Resolution passed by the European Parliament recently, a Resolution which counts as the EP’s broad official position (on principles) at this stage of proceedings.
Calm down everyone for you do not know whereof you write.
Obviously the UK government didn’t take up the idea of separate deals so the EU moved on from it. Brussels however is still making positive noises about an independent Scotland in the EU.
Reelguid
With respect, it is time for you to get real. Really.
There was nothing for the UK to “take up” – especially not before Article 50 was even triggered – because “negotiating documents” from the European Parliament were/are squit.
That is because the European Parliament is not the negotiator for the European Union. Therefore the alleged documents to which you proudly refer cannot be “negotiating documents” but are probably – if they even exist – merely some of the innumerable bits of paper flying around in Brussels and Strasbourg the one with less status than the other.
Well, it is quite good news that there will be a general election soon.
If nothing else, we shall see whether the oppressed masses are going to throw off their Tory chains and vote massively for Mr Jeremy Cor-byn and his merry bunch of leftists.
W shall also see whether the SNP will keep its stranglehold on MPs from Scotchland.
The downside, for this blog at least, is that the Eminences will now go into overdrive for the next 5 weeks or so. The prospect appalls 🙂
Before the referendum the SNP told us they had legal advice that an independent Scotland would have automatic membership of the EU. They spent tax payer’s money fighting a FOI request to reveal what the legal advice was before admitting they had lied and no such legal advice existed.
https://eujournalism.blogactiv.eu/2012/10/23/salmond-branded-a-liar-over-non-existent-eu-membership-advice/
Do they honestly believe the people of Scotland are stupid enough to fall for the same lie again?
‘The downside, for this blog at least, is that the Eminences will now go into overdrive for the next 5 weeks or so.’
If you can count, we have to wait 7 weeks for this vain woman’s gambit to take place.
I think a General Election is on the cards for June 2017
Speculation rife over PM statement at Number 10
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-39627690
Confirmed.
Well it seems Mrs May has seen fit to call an election on June 8th, unlike former PM Gordon Brown who so lacked the courage of his convictions.
You sure know how to damn with faint praise.
She’s a liar.
Only recently, sitting in No 10, she told Marr that she would not be calling any snap election.
And so is Andrew Marr. It’s been a topic of conversation among them for months.
I note that the UK continues to get up off the floor and will shortly consult its people as to whether they wish to adopt a servile and supine position or whether they wish to throw off their chains and stand as free people.
Pretty soon the Scots will be forced to look down the barrel of their suicide machine gun. Whaddya wanna do – pull the trigger and die a hideous and pointless death or stand for truth and justice? For the Scots this election is analogous to a national intelligence test – results will be published and the unvarnished truth will emerge, whatever that may be.
The Liberals will get to see that there are not many votes in craven cowardice and the adoption of dictatorship by the enlightened..
Jeremy Corbyn will get to understand that there are few votes in representing the interests of workers in a post work society. There are even less votes available for a for a strain of thought that views categorization as a system of exclusion and thought as tool of oppression. So wave bye bye to the Labour Party.
The Conservative Party looks a good bet – but no-one really knows how many fifth columnists are hiding in their ranks. The looming shadow of UKIP should be enough motivation for the Conservatives to take care of their own problems without the need for outside intervention.
Once this is done the British will be in a position to fully defend themselves from the crazies in the EU, and will once again stand as a beacon of light in a world where the lights are rapidly going out. Do Scots really want to act as a flimsy shield behind which the utterly corrupt EU will seek to hide?
For the times they are a changing.
Interesting point of view from Deutsche Bank : –
https://twitter.com/EdConwaySky/status/854328227053096962
Gambling on a Tory victory, this then effectively gives the Tory Party 3 years to “sell” a transitional deal with the EU (as opposed to 1 year had they stuck to the fixed term). The kind of transitional deal that is not actually transitional because, having stared into the abyss, the people of the UK with be even less likely to go for a full blooded Brexit.
Half in Europe – still run by Europe so to speak, but without the citizen perk of FoM. Still, the financiers and big business will be pleased, which is probably why Sterling has been boosted a tad.
I bought the Sunday Telegraph today in a spirit of enquiry and curiosity -I confess I am a pathetic political nerd. In a fairly comprehensive summary of news and comment on the current political scene the only reference to the SNP -54 seats at Westminster was that Nicola Sturgeon was chairing a routine meeting of her cabinet in Edinburgh when Mrs May revealed that there would be a General Election in May. There was a great deal of news and comment on both the LibDems -8 seats at Westminster -and of UKIP who managed to lose their only MP last week. The edition of the paper I bought stated that it was printed in Scotland but why they bother is beyond me!
An identical lack of balance occurred in the last BBC new bulletin I saw at 10.00pm tonight.
Of course anyone can see that our media here is controlled by exterior interests and those manipulate the presentation of news. We must be grateful to Craig Murray and other bloggers for their attempts to rectify this.