YouGov Polls 2007

'This latest poll should make Labour question its strategy. Labour's brutally effective attacks on the SNP in the past left the nationalists wondering what had hit them. The electorate is now less susceptible to scare stories. Only 8% of Scots believe independence would make Scotland more vulnerable to terrorist attack or that border patrols will be started. Fears of economic meltdown are less prevalent. There is not much in it when Scots are asked whether independence would make them better or worse off economically. This is not a victory for the SNP but it represents a significant shift in opinion.' Professor James Mitchell in the Sunday Times, 14 th January 2007.

Voters back SNP but snub separatism

By Jason Allardyce in the Sunday Times 14 th January 2007

THE Scottish nationalists have recorded their highest level of support for a decade and are on course to form a ruling administration at Holyrood for the first time.

However, their victory is unlikely to lead to the break-up of the United Kingdom, according to the results of a new poll.

The Sunday Times/YouGov survey, conducted ahead of next week's 300th anniversary of the Act of Union, puts the SNP six points ahead of Labour in the first-past-the-post vote.

If replicated at the ballot box the swing would unseat four of Jack McConnell's ministers: Andy Kerr, the health minister and his closest ally, Hugh Henry, the education minister, and junior colleagues Lewis Macdonald and Sarah Boyack.

The nationalists are expected to push for an independence referendum after winning power but the poll, the most detailed survey yet of attitudes north and south of the border, shows that only a minority of voters are in favour of Scotland going it alone.

More than half of Scots (53%) believe the union is worth maintaining while only 28% of English voters think Scotland should go its own way.

While there is some dissatisfaction with the current constitutional arrangements - most Scots who expressed a preference believe Scotland gets a raw deal from the Union - almost as many believe Scotland would be worse off rather than better off under independence.

A majority who expressed a view believe that taxes would rise under independence and that there is a 'black hole' in the SNP's financial plans. A minority believe the stereotypical views of the English and only a third say they support England's opponents at football. The survey also shows that Scots have a more negative view of themselves than the English have of Scots.

Questions to English voters showed that a only a third believe independence is inevitable. Most believe they still have a lot in common with the Scots and few believe the stereotypical views of the Scots: that they are too welfare dependent, too left-wing and there are too many running the country.

Some 41% of English voters felt too many Scots were anti-English but 39% described the Scots as a warm and friendly nation. Just one in five English adults think too many Scots have a chip on their shoulder and drink too much.

The English also remain tolerant of the anomalies thrown up by devolution. Despite a series of complaints from senior English politicians about high levels of public spending in Scotland, only a small minority of voters south of the border are concerned. Little over a third of English voters think Scotland gets more than its fair share of public spending at the expense of English taxpayers.

Similarly, concerns about the number of Scots in the government, caricatured by Jeremy Paxman as the Scottish 'Raj', are shared by only one in three English voters.

This weekend Tom Devine, widely regarded as Scotland's pre-eminent historian and a favourite of Jack McConnell's, added his voice to the debate, saying he believed Scotland could thrive as an independent country. Yesterday, the chancellor Gordon Brown issued a dire warning that the union was at risk from a 'dangerous drift' towards separatism.

Alex Salmond, leader of the SNP said about the poll: 'This is excellent news. It shows our support is strong.'

Electorate ignoring the scares

By James Mitchell in the Sunday Times 14 th January 2007

AT this stage four years ago, Labour had a commanding lead in the polls over the SNP. The tables have been turned. Of course, we have seen polls showing substantial leads for the SNP before, but this time the difference is in the timing. The SNP has never done so well at this stage in the electoral cycle.

This latest poll should make Labour question its strategy. Labour's brutally effective attacks on the SNP in the past left the nationalists wondering what had hit them. The electorate is now less susceptible to scare stories. Only 8% of Scots believe independence would make Scotland more vulnerable to terrorist attack or that border patrols will be started. Fears of economic meltdown are less prevalent. There is not much in it when Scots are asked whether independence would make them better or worse off economically. This is not a victory for the SNP but it represents a significant shift in opinion.

Headline figures showing a majority for independence only tell part of the story. The electorate may at first appear confused but it is, in fact, sophisticated: 47% of Scots think the Union gives Scotland a raw deal while 32% think it gets a good deal, but 53% think the Union is worth preserving and only 33% disagree. Many Scots are sympathetic to Scottish independence but only a core of about a third are committed to this goal.

The sympathy dissolves as difficult questions are raised around economic viability, the competence of an SNP government and levels of taxation. The SNP has made significant advances in these terms but remains vulnerable.

Scotland has matured politically since devolution. Scary stories no longer work. Economic viability and competence, issues of taxation and expenditure are not only a more rational basis of debate, they are also more likely to engage the electorate.

The nationalists will be pleased with this poll but, short of some catastrophe for Labour, this is likely to be as good as it gets. Even on this scenario, forming a coalition will be difficult. An SNP-Lib Dem coalition would not command a majority in the parliament. Scotland may be set to have minority coalition government after May with no two parties - other than an unlikely coalition of Labour and the SNP - able to combine to form a majority. Not only will parliamentary arithmetic create headaches for coalition formation, but money will be tighter than in the recent past, making it more difficult to buy off smaller parties in any coalition.

A rainbow coalition of parties supporting independence would hardly be worth the trouble as it would neither produce a majority in the parliament nor create stable government. The increase in the number of Greens and Scottish Socialist party MSPs in 2003 hid an underlying vulnerability. If 2003 was the year of independents and others, then 2007 may prove to be the year of the established parties.

If the SNP is the largest party, independence will be on the agenda and a referendum becomes a real possibility, although there are senior members of the SNP who would be more than happy to avoid one. In the end a referendum act is more likely to be passed by Westminster, on London's terms, than by the Scottish parliament.

James Mitchell is professor of politics at the University of Strathclyde

Focus: Saving the Union

The SNP may soon become the single biggest party in Scotland, paving the way for the possible break-up of Britain. Can Gordon Brown stop the rot? Kenny Farquharson reports

From the Sunday Times 14 th January 2007

Britain is in peril; but fear not, Gordon Brown will save the day. The chancellor set out yesterday to rescue the Union that binds England and Scotland - and, as some Scots critics pointed out, to ensure he has a country to govern if and when he becomes prime minister.

Faced with opinion polls indicating that the Scottish Nationalists are likely to be elected to power in Edinburgh in four months' time, Brown warned that the world's most enduring partnership of nations was under threat from this 'dangerous drift' towards separatism.

'It is time to speak up for supporters of the Union,' he wrote in a newspaper article. 'It is time to acknowledge Great Britain for the success it has been and is: a model for the world of how nations can not only live side by side but are stronger together and weaker apart.

'Perhaps in the past we could get by with a Britishness that was assumed without being explicitly stated. But when our country is being challenged in Scotland, Wales and now England by secessionists, it is right to be explicit about what we, the British people, share in common and the patriotic vision for our country's future.'

His remarks raised the tone of a debate that has for the past two weeks been diverted by the rakish figure of Archie Stirling - a Perthshire laird, nephew of the founder of the SAS and former husband of Diana Rigg, the actress.

A former Scots Guards officer, Stirling will next month launch his own political party, the Scottish Democrats. An early draft of its mission statement contains a rallying cry to prevent the break-up of Britain: 'The history of the Union is one of advantage to Scotland. Scottish culture is distinct from English culture, not hostile to it.'

Since his plans leaked out at the start of the year, he has been lampooned as the man least likely to rescue the United Kingdom. His real purpose is to raise the calibre of Scottish politicians by getting his talented pals elected to the Edinburgh parliament. But he has had the role of saviour thrust upon him - both by Union supporters desperate to find a figurehead for their cause, and by the gleeful Scottish media and toff-baiting political class.

Brown's intervention is a reminder that there is more at stake than a bout of Scottish class warfare. Exactly 300 years ago this Tuesday, the old Scottish parliament voted to ratify the Treaty of Union to join Scotland to England. Three centuries of shared history later, Britain is waking up to the realisation that the UK could soon be no more.

On May 3, Scotland will elect a new Scottish parliament. Polls suggest the Scottish National party (SNP) is poised to seize power.

A YouGov poll for today's Sunday Times shows the SNP set to win 44 seats at Holyrood, ahead of Labour with 43, the Lib Dems with 18, the Scottish Tories with 18 and smaller parties and independents sharing the remaining six seats in the 129-seat legislature. Increasingly, an SNP-led coalition looks the likeliest outcome, and Alex Salmond, the party's leader, has pledged to hold a referendum on independence.

Recent polls suggest that in such a referendum Scots would back independence, leading to the start of negotiations between London and Edinburgh on full separation. Scotland would demand its share of the value of Britain's myriad assets, from embassies abroad to the Parachute Regiment. Naturally these assets would include the North Sea oilfields, which, in the next five years alone, are expected to produce £75 billion in tax revenues.

Negotiations would begin on the removal of Britain's nuclear missile submarine base from Faslane on the River Clyde. And the MP for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath - a certain Gordon Brown - would have to decide whether he should resign himself to a political future in an independent Scotland or try to switch to a safe seat in England.

The last thing the chancellor needs is anything that reminds English voters he is Scottish. He faces demands at Westminster for English votes for English laws, and demands for Scotland to get a smaller share of public spending. Give in and he risks turning Labour supporters in Scotland towards the SNP. Resist and he allows the Conservatives to seed England with discontent at his Scottishness.

THE Scottish political agenda has been dominated by a seemingly inexorable drift towards separatism for months. This began with a Sunday Times poll that revealed that more Scots favoured living in an independent nation than remaining part of the United Kingdom - an apparent doubling of support for independence since 2000.

Scottish intellectuals, business leaders and senior churchmen who previously backed the Union or kept their political affiliations private have begun to declare publicly, if not their support for independence, at least a belief that Scotland can thrive as an independent nation.

Tom Devine of Edinburgh University, Scotland's pre-eminent historian, this weekend added his voice to the debate. 'There is no doubt,' he said, 'that a lot of the traditional supports for the Union have disappeared in recent years.'

He added cautiously: 'It is difficult at an economic level to argue for or against it, given the ambiguity of the statistical evidence.'

Even stalwarts of the Conservative party - whose working-class vote in Scotland held unionist opinion firm from the 1950s until the rise of the SNP in the mid-1970s - are making an intellectual case for separatism.

Support from the right is predicated on the belief that Scotland's over-subsidised economy - public spending exceeds 50% of gross domestic product and one in four jobs are in the public sector - will only become truly wealth creating if its politicians are given complete fiscal responsibility.

Last year Michael Fry, one of Scotland's most prominent unionist historians and a former Conservative candidate, performed a remarkable volte-face by declaring his support for independence.

On the eve of the Tory conference in Bournemouth, Fry accused the party leadership in Scotland of 'appalling drift and complacency' and said it would be best if it 'just died out'. Formerly a staunch defender of the Union, he said: 'I have changed my mind. I believe in an independent Scotland. I will do what I can to bring it about. Devolution has proved to be completely hopeless, if anything making Scotland a worse country rather than a better country. We have to do something different. As I don't think we can go back, we have to go forward.'

ALL is not lost for the Union even if the SNP does become the largest party at Holyrood after May 3. To become first minister, Salmond will need the backing of one or more of the smaller parties. The Scottish Greens, who are expected to win two seats, back independence; but the Lib Dems do not, and will not even agree to a referendum.

If Salmond insists that any coalition partner must back a referendum, then he could see the chance of power slip through his fingers. The SNP could end up in opposition, with Labour and the Lib Dems forming their third coalition government in a row.

Some nationalists fear that Salmond, 52, will be sorely tempted to sacrifice his referendum policy to have a taste of power. He is known to believe that the next challenge for the nationalists is to prove themselves competent in power and so ease fears about taking the next step to independence. Salmond denies he is about to ditch the central plank of SNP policy, but doubts persist.

There is another problem for the nationalists. Under the Scotland Act, power over the constitution is reserved to Westminster. Would an SNP-led administration in Edinburgh have the legal competence to hold a referendum on breaking up Britain? Westminster might insist that it runs the referendum - and, crucially, chooses the question.

The question is crucial, as today's Sunday Times poll indicates. Its key finding suggests that, despite the SNP's current strength, support for Scotland's going it alone seems to vary considerably.

When Scots are asked if they want 'independence', a majority say yes; an ICM poll last week had 51% for independence and 36% saying no. But our YouGov poll asked this question: 'Do you think the Union between Scotland and England is or is not worth maintaining?' To this question, 55% said it was worth maintaining, with 33% against.

This see-sawing of opinion is the result of complex loyalties as Scottishness tussles with Britishness. Many Labour supporters would not dream of voting SNP, but back independence. Many prospective SNP voters are simply rebellious Labourites who want to give Blair a bloody nose over Iraq but would return to the fold if Brown was party leader.

But the prospective prime minister has a broader target than the Scots in his paean to Britishness: the national flag should be reclaimed from the British National party, British history should be at the heart of the modern school curriculum, and an 'institute of Britishness could encourage debate on our identity'.

This is an appeal not to the Scots but to the English. For England is the real constituency that will decide whether he is prime minister long enough to save the Union.

Time for a united front

Leading article in the Sunday Times 14 th January 2007

The Union is indeed in peril - but it is not yet dead in the ditch. Britain is only just waking up to the fact that on May 3, Scotland goes to the polls and may well elect a nationalist government intent on breaking up the United Kingdom.

Britain has been a power in the world for 300 years, with Scotland and England partners in forging an empire, nurturing industry, creating prosperity and fighting fascism. If Scots want that partnership to end, there is nothing the rest of Britain can do. But our YouGov poll today shows that many Scots are in two minds about independence and may yet be dissuaded from taking the nationalist road. Their dalliance with the SNP may be attributed to disillusionment with Tony Blair, the war in Iraq, or boredom with the lacklustre administration of Jack McConnell, the first minister, rather than a new-found conviction about the merits of a separate Scottish state. Voters have yet to come to a considered decision on whom they will support. Labour, however, is in danger of helping them reach their conclusion.

Professor Tom Devine, one of Scotland's pre-eminent historians, warns in today's Sunday Times that the scaremongering of Labour politicians about the perils of independence could be doing the Union cause more harm than good.

The warning is timely and apposite. Labour strategists won the Holyrood elections in 1999 and 2003 with scare tactics about a separate Scotland, by talk of 'divorce' and financial 'black holes'. They believe they can do so again. They are wrong.

Scotland has moved on and has gained in self-confidence in the past few years. Regardless of the rights and wrongs of the debate, Scotland does not take kindly to being told that it is too small, too poor or too stupid to take charge of its own affairs. Scots are proud people, after all. In order to save the Union, the case for it must be put in positive terms - yes, economically, but also culturally and with a sense of shared endeavour and history.

SNP hails poll lead over Labour

From ic Scotland 14 th January 2007

Scottish Nationalists have welcomed a new poll which put them six points ahead of Labour in the constituency vote as the Holyrood elections draw ever closer.

The SNP claimed the figures represented its biggest lead in any poll since 2000.

The survey by YouGov for the Sunday Times, conducted days ahead of the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union, put the nationalists on 35% in the first past the post vote and Labour on 29%. The Lib Dems polled 18%, while the Tories recorded 13% support.

SNP hails poll lead over Labour

From 24dash 14 th January 2007

Scottish Nationalists welcomed a new poll today which put them six points ahead of Labour in the constituency vote as the Holyrood elections draw ever closer.

The SNP claimed the figures represented its biggest lead in any poll since 2000.

The survey by YouGov for the Sunday Times, conducted days ahead of the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union, put the nationalists on 35% in the first past the post vote and Labour on 29%.

The Lib Dems polled 18%, while the Tories recorded 13% support.

On the second "list" vote, which allocates seats by proportional representation, the SNP was on 32% and Labour netted 30% support.

The newspaper claimed that if the study's findings were replicated at the ballot box, the swing would unseat four of Labour's Scottish Parliament ministers.

But despite the findings, the poll of 1,005 voters in Scotland and 1,924 voters in England suggested only a minority of voters were in favour of Scottish independence.

More than half of Scots - 53% - said they believed the Union was worth keeping, and only 28% of English voters said they thought Scotland should go its own way.

The study came after a recent poll in the Daily Mail put support for Scottish independence at 51% in Scotland - and at 48% in England.

And a survey for the Sunday Telegraph in November suggested support for independence was running at 52% in Scotland and 59% in England.

The SNP's campaign director Angus Robertson MP said the latest figures represented the party's strongest poll rating of the election campaign so far.

He said: "We have a six-point lead over Labour on the first question, and are six-points up since the last Sunday Times/YouGov poll in September.

"In polls with all the party preferences, this is the SNP's biggest Holyrood lead in any poll since the fuel crisis of 2000.

"The Scottish Parliament election is a straight two-horse race between the SNP and London Labour.

"This poll is clear evidence that Labour's negative campaign has backfired, and people are increasingly attracted to an SNP campaign that is positive about Scotland."

Reacting to the figures, Labour pointed to a poll in today's Sunday Herald, which put Labour ahead of the SNP.

The TNS System Three poll showed Labour on 38%, five points ahead of the Nationalists in the constituency vote.

In the list vote, they recorded support of 31%, with the SNP on 30%.

A Labour spokesman said: "We know that the only consistent thing about the polls is their inconsistency.

"It is clear that there is no discernible trend and no consistent pattern on voting intentions." He said the polls did, however, show that voters remain unconvinced by the SNP's arguments on independence.

"When you look beyond the unreliable voting intention figures and examine specific opinion, there remains deep rooted opposition to the core SNP policy of separation," he said.

"The only other thing we can be sure of is that when it comes to the SNP, opinion polls are rarely accurate - they overestimate their support and they do not reflect their results on polling day. "In the 2001 General Election, 2003 Scottish Parliament election and 2005 General Election no poll accurately predicted the correct result in Scotland.

"So while they may make extravagant claims based on one off poll findings, they haven't learned that poll findings rarely reflect actual votes in the ballot box - especially when it comes to voting Nationalist."

The Liberal Democrats said the poll hailed by Nationalists today only put the SNP three points ahead of where they were in January 2003.

By contrast, the Liberal Democrats were six points ahead of their position three years ago, a spokesman said.

He said: "The SNP are clearly panicking as it becomes clear that no matter how bitter their battle with Labour becomes, the Scottish public are not turning towards independence.

"While Labour and the SNP continue to fight each other, the Lib Dems will be fighting for schools and hospitals."

SNP Welcome Sunday Times Poll

From the Scottish National Party 14 th January 2007

The Scottish National PartyÕs Campaign Director Mr Angus Robertson MP welcomed the results of the YouGov poll in the Sunday Times today, which gives the SNP a six-point lead over Labour on the first question, the strongest rating of the campaign, and a six-point increase since the last YouGov Sunday Times poll last September.

On the first Scottish Parliament question, the poll is (Sep 2006 figures in brackets):

SNP	35	(29)
Labour	29	(30)
LibDem	18	(18)
Tory	13	(14)
Other	6	Ê

The second question ratings are:

SNP	32	(29)
Labour	30	(27)
Tory	14	(14)
LibDem	14	(15)
Other	10	Ê

Mr Robertson said:

'This gives the SNP our strongest poll rating of the campaign.Ê We have a six-point lead over Labour on the first question, and are six-points up since the last Sunday Times/YouGov poll in September.

'In polls with all the party preferences, this is the SNPÕs biggest Holyrood lead in any poll since the fuel crisis of 2000.

'The Scottish Parliament election is a straight two-horse race between the SNP and London Labour.Ê This poll is clear evidence that LabourÕs negative campaign has backfired, and people are increasingly attracted to an SNP campaign that is positive about Scotland.

'On independence, the Mail/ICM poll last week and Telegraph/ICM poll in November showed majority support when the issue is asked in a straightforward, neutral fashion, as opposed to questions which frame the issue negatively.'

ENDS

Notes:

The Mail/ICM poll last week showed that 51% were in favour of independence and 36% against; and the Telegraph/ICM poll showed 52% support to 35% against.

Voters back SNP ... but not independence

By Hamish MacDonnell, Scottish Political Editor in the Scotsman 15 th January 2007

THE SNP has strengthened its lead over Labour, but this is not being translated into support for independence, according to a new poll published yesterday.

A YouGov poll put the SNP six points ahead of Labour in the constituency vote and two points ahead of Labour in the regional list vote. The poll has the SNP on 35 per cent in the constituency vote and 32 per cent in the regional vote; Labour had 29 per cent and 30 per cent; the Liberal Democrats 18 per cent and 14 per cent; and the Tories 13 per cent and 14 per cent.

But the same poll found only 33 per cent of Scots in favour of independence, considerably less than the 51 per cent in favour in a Scotsman ICM poll last year.

YouGov is an internet polling organisation and can only research the views of those who have signed up to be polled, so it is seen as more restrictive and less representative than traditional polling methods. But the poll does support the growing impression that the SNP is holding its advantage over Labour as the campaign for the Holyrood elections enters its final, hectic three-month period.

It also suggests that the SNP is picking up support from disillusioned Labour voters rather than because of a definite drift towards independence.

Labour's internal polling is understood to provide much the same picture, with support for the SNP growing, but without this being reflected in stronger backing for independence. It appears that voters want to see someone else in charge of the country, but do not want to split from England.

This may have been in Alex Salmond's mind when he appeared to alter his party's approach to an independence referendum.

The SNP leader, speaking on BBC1's The Politics Show, said he intended to produce a white paper - an initial consultative document - on an independence referendum within 100 days of taking power. Previously he has claimed he would produce a full parliamentary bill.

Mr Salmond announced this shift in a letter to The Scotsman last week, but this was the first time he had taken the opportunity to explain exactly what the new policy means.

The SNP leader said: "What is encompassed in the white paper is the proposal for the referendum and the question, so people can see what we are proposing. We are not soft-pedalling, we are putting forward a white paper in the first 100 days which spells out the question and the route forward for Scotland."

Mr Salmond also insisted that the referendum would be non-negotiable if the SNP became the biggest party in the Scottish Parliament and the dominant party in a coalition.

A Liberal Democrat spokesman said afterwards: "The lack of support for independence has led to panic in the SNP. Salmond's changing position on a referendum is down to the fact that he knows that there is no support for his referendum."

However, Mr Salmond did receive a boost yesterday with the backing of Crawford Beveridge, a former chief executive of Scottish Enterprise. "Scotland is just as capable of running its own affairs as any other country," he said.

Bookmakers are now offering odds of 10/1 that Scotland will become independent in the next 50 years. William Hill has also cut the odds on the SNP becoming the largest party in the Scottish Parliament from 50/1 to 25/1.

On chances of independence, William Hill offers odds of 200/1 that Scotland will become independent of the rest of Britain within five years; 100/1 within ten years and 10/1 within 50 years.

Cameron attacks Brown on Union

DAVID Cameron yesterday hit back at Gordon Brown as the political debate about the Union between Scotland and England intensified.

Amid growing signs of strain on the 300-year-old Union, the Chancellor has put himself at the head of a campaign to keep the United Kingdom intact.

At the weekend, he accused the Conservatives of undermining the Union through their policy of banning Scottish MPs from voting on legislation that affects only England.

Mr Cameron, the Tory leader, yesterday retaliated, claiming that it was Mr Brown and the Labour government who had done most to encourage separatist pressures on both sides of the Border. "He's now launching a debate about Britishness. He has had ten years to do something about Britishness," Mr Cameron said in a BBC television interview.

"Why don't we teach British history properly in our schools? Why has the government been doing such profoundly un-British things like carving up the country into regions and introducing a national ID card scheme?"

In an interview with The Scotsman on Saturday, Mr Brown painted a bleak picture of life in an independent Scotland, warning that key Scottish industries like financial services and scientific research would be put at risk if the Scottish National Party leads the Scottish Executive after the May elections.

Writing in a Sunday newspaper, Mr Cameron echoed SNP charges that Labour is engaged in the politics of fear, accusing Mr Brown of an attempt to "intimidate Scotland".

JAMES KIRKUP

SNP hails six point lead in polls

By Hamish MacDonnell, Scottish Political Editor in the Yorkshire Post 15 th January 2007

Scottish Nationalists welcomed a new poll yesterday which put them six points ahead of Labour in the constituency vote as the Holyrood elections draw ever closer.

The SNP claimed the figures represented its biggest lead in any poll since 2000.

The survey by YouGov for The Sunday Times, conducted days ahead of the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union, put the nationalists on 35 per cent in the first past the post vote and Labour on 29 per cent. The Lib Dems polled 18 per cent, while the Tories recorded 13 per cent support.

On the second "list" vote, which allocates seats by proportional representation, the SNP was on 32 per cent and Labour netted 30 per cent support.

The newspaper claimed that if the study's findings were replicated at the ballot box, the swing would unseat four of Labour's Scottish Parliament ministers.

But despite the findings, the poll of 1,005 voters in Scotland and 1,924 voters in England suggested only a minority of voters were in favour of Scottish independence.

More than half of Scots Ð 53 per cent Ð said they believed the Union was worth keeping, and only 28 per cent of English voters said they thought Scotland should go its own way.

The study came after a recent poll in the Daily Mail put support for Scottish independence at 51per cent in Scotland and 48 per cent in England.

And a survey for the Sunday Telegraph in November suggested support for independence was running at 52per cent in Scotland and 59per cent in England.

The SNP's campaign director Angus Robertson MP said the latest figures represented the party's strongest poll rating of the election campaign so far.

He said: "This poll is clear evidence that Labour's negative campaign has backfired, and people are increasingly attracted to an SNP campaign that is positive about Scotland."