Well, there was another fairly earth shattering political poll in Scotland released yesterday. Lord Ashcroft, a former Tory peer, polled 1000 people from constituencies-of-interest i.e. Westminster constituencies that voted Yes to Scottish Independence and revealed that MPs with nearly 20,000 vote majorities
]will be toppled in May if the trends continue. He also polled Gordon and Inverness - areas that voted No to independence (although Inverness itself, the city I mean, voted Yes - just not the rural area outside it) and showed they would also go to the SNP, electing the former First Minister Alex Salmond to the House of Commons and toppling Danny Alexander, the UK government Chief Secretary to the Treasury, among other notable UK-level figures.
I have a summary here of the seats as taken from
one of my favourite Scottish political blogs that cover polling analysis:
Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey :
SNP 50% (+31)
Liberal Democrats 21% (-20)
Labour 14% (-8)
Conservatives 11% (-2)
(This would be an SNP gain from the Liberal Democrats. Danny Alexander of the Liberal Democrats would lose his seat.)
Gordon :
SNP 43% (+21)
Liberal Democrats 26% (-10)
Labour 14% (-6)
Conservatives 11% (-8)
(This would be an SNP gain from the Liberal Democrats. Alex Salmond of the SNP would return to the UK parliament after a five-year gap.)
Airdrie and Shotts :
SNP 47% (+23)
Labour 39% (-19)
Conservatives 7% (-2)
Liberal Democrats 1% (-7)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Pamela Nash of Labour would lose her seat.)
Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill :
SNP 46% (+29)
Labour 43% (-24)
Conservatives 6% (-2)
Liberal Democrats 1% (-7)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour.)
Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East :
SNP 52% (+28)
Labour 34% (-23)
Conservatives 6% (-2)
Liberal Democrats 2% (-8)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Gregg McClymont of Labour would lose his seat.)
Dundee West :
SNP 59% (+30)
Labour 25% (-23)
Conservatives 6% (-3)
Liberal Democrats 3% (-8)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Jim McGovern of Labour would lose his seat.)
Glasgow Central :
SNP 45% (+27)
Labour 35% (-17)
Conservatives 5% (-2)
Liberal Democrats 3% (-13)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Anas Sarwar of Labour would lose his seat.)
Glasgow East :
SNP 51% (+26)
Labour 37% (-25)
Conservatives 4% (-1)
Liberal Democrats 1% (-4)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Margaret Curran of Labour would lose her seat.)
Glasgow North :
SNP 45% (+33)
Labour 33% (-12)
Conservatives 5% (-2)
Liberal Democrats 4% (-27)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Ann McKechin of Labour would lose her seat.)
Glasgow North-East :
Labour 46% (-22)
SNP 39% (+25)
Conservatives 4% (-1)
Liberal Democrats 1% (-7)
(This would be a Labour hold. Willie Bain of Labour would retain his seat.)
Glasgow North-West :
SNP 44% (+29)
Labour 38% (-16)
Conservatives 7% (-3)
Liberal Democrats 3% (-13)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. John Robertson of Labour would lose his seat.)
Glasgow South :
SNP 48% (+28)
Labour 33% (-19)
Conservatives 9% (-2)
Liberal Democrats 2% (-10)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Tom "Bomber Admin" Harris of Labour would lose his seat.)
Glasgow South-West :
SNP 45% (+29)
Labour 42% (-20)
Conservatives 4% (-3)
Liberal Democrats 2% (-7)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Ian Davidson of Labour would lose his seat. Let the Lord be praised.)
Motherwell and Wishaw :
SNP 50% (+32)
Labour 39% (-22)
Conservatives 5% (-4)
Liberal Democrats 1% (-9)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour.)
Paisley and Renfrewshire South :
SNP 48% (+30)
Labour 40% (-20)
Conservatives 6% (-4)
Liberal Democrats 2% (-8)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Douglas Alexander of Labour would lose his seat.)
West Dunbartonshire :
SNP 47% (+27)
Labour 38% (-23)
Conservatives 6% (-2)
Liberal Democrats 1% (-7)
(This would be an SNP gain from Labour. Gemma Doyle of Labour would lose her seat.)
To put this in perspective - if this poll was the situation in the general election in May, the SNP would all but wipe out Labour from Glasgow at a Westminster level, leaving only Glasgow North East in Labour control. They would take Coatbridge - basically Scotland's answer to Southie in Boston (one Coatbridge resident fought in the 1916 Rising in Ireland) - which has been represented by a Labour MP (continuous and unbroken in representation) since 1935. I've heard people say that if the SNP somehow manage to get elected in Coatbridge, which voted Yes I should add, then they will personally wash the feet of the new MP because he's basically the Lord Jesus Christ.
Glasgow North East saddened me a bit, but we don't really have any decent local SNP up there ready to cope with the campaign they need to overturn Willie Bain's now-7% majority. That constituency needs more work, and really, I don't think they
should have an SNP representative - they're much better suited to having someone from the SSP. To let you understand, even though Glasgow North East voted Yes by some majority, it has been represented by Labour continuously since 1922 with one short blip of about 4 years under a Tory, but only because a Communist stood there in 1931 and was so popular he split the Labour vote and a Tory sneaked in. "North East" Glasgow, to give a better name to it, is known to most Glaswegians as Springburn. It's probably the most deprived area in the whole of Glasgow, and also recognised as the most left wing constituency in the UK. The fact that the SNP are 7% off beating Labour there just shows the kind of earthquakes taking place in this country.
I should add finally, as I did during the independence campaign, that opinion polls are snapshots not predictions. I can only hope that the real election is somewhere close to this - but Labour are running out of time. They only have three months.
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