 | 'In the 1979 UK general election, Margaret Thatcher pilloried Labour's record in office with the slogan "Labour isn't working". Now it seems the very same slogan sums up Labour's efforts to win the 2007 Scottish election.' Professor John Curtice in the Scotsman, 28 th February 2007. |  |
THE SNP has managed to maintain its commanding lead over Labour in the battle for Holyrood - despite a decline in support for independence, according to a Scotsman ICM poll published today.
The poll gives the Nationalists a five per cent lead over Labour on the constituency vote and a four per cent lead on the regional vote. But the poll also recorded a 10 per cent swing against independence in the past four months.
This suggests Scots are willing to vote SNP in protest at the Labour-led governments in Holyrood and Westminster but do not agree with the party's core message of independence.
The poll is bad news for Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, who insisted yesterday Labour was winning the battle of ideas with the SNP.
When asked by The Scotsman at his monthly press conference whether Labour was "winning the argument against the SNP", the Prime Minister replied confidently: "There is no doubt we are winning the argument. Now we have just got to go and win the election. We have the best policies."
Mr Blair shrugged off Nationalist claims that his association with the war in Iraq and the cash-for-peerages scandal made him an electoral liability in Scotland, and signalled he would continue to make regular visits north of the Border before polling day.
"Some people like you and some people don't like you. That's just how it is after ten years in the job," he said.
But, according to this latest poll, the Prime Minister's assessment is wide of the mark. If carried through to the election, today's poll would give the SNP the most seats at Holyrood and put Alex Salmond into Bute House as Scotland's first SNP first minister - if he could secure the support of the Liberal Democrats.
Mr Salmond said last night: "This clearly shows how out of touch Tony Blair is with Scotland and the Scottish people. This poll demonstrates that Labour's negative, London-led campaign is simply not working in Scotland."
Under the poll results, Labour would have too few MSPs to form a coalition with the Liberal Democrats and would have to try to rule as a minority government or patch together an unlikely coalition with the smaller parties to get into government again.
Translated into seats, the poll would give the SNP 44 to Labour's 41 - a major turnaround on 2003, giving the SNP 17 more seats than they won then and Labour nine fewer.
The Liberal Democrats would also see a big improvement, with 23 MSPs gaining an extra six seats on the 17 they won in 2003, while the Conservatives would be down slightly, with 17 seats, not the 18 they won in 2003.
According to the poll, the SNP is in line to win 34 per cent on the constituency vote, up 1 per cent on last month, and 32 per cent on the regional vote, down 1 per cent.
Labour has clawed back some limited ground on the SNP on the regional list vote but not enough to start a turnaround in its fortunes.
Labour has the support of 29 per cent of the public on the constituency vote, down two per cent on January, and 28 per cent on the regional list vote, up one per cent on last month.
The ICM poll did, however, find a decline in support for independence, suggesting the SNP's continued success is more about disillusionment with Labour than about a growing demand for independence.
Some 46 per cent of Scots now favour independence, with 44 per cent against, a swing of 10 per cent against independence since ICM last asked this question in October 2006.
The key message is that, while Scottish voters are being attracted to the SNP, they are reluctant to back independence.
This suggests Labour's assault on the implications of independence, which has seen high- profile speeches by the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the past two weeks, has worked - at least as far as independence is concerned.
What it has failed to do, however, is persuade disillusioned Labour supporters to stick with the Blair and McConnell governments.
Cathy Jamieson, Labour's campaign chair, continued to stress the anti-independence message in response to the poll.
She said: "This shows that more and more hard-working families across Scotland are worried about just how much independence would cost them.
"The reality on 3 May is that the SNP doesn't come without independence and independence doesn't come without a price."
SNP managers, however, will be delighted to be entering the final stages of a Holyrood campaign better-placed than they have ever been before. In 1999 and 2003, the Nationalists were trailing Labour at this point.
The Liberal Democrats are holding steady with 16 per cent on the constituency vote (up 1 per cent) and 17 per cent on the regional vote (no change).
But the party is still a long way short of becoming the biggest party in the Scottish Parliament - the stated aim of Nicol Stephen, the party's Scottish leader.
Mr Stephen said: "This poll is further evidence of the growing strength of support for the Liberal Democrats across Scotland."
The poll contains good news for the Conservatives, however, giving the Tories 16 per cent on the constituency vote (up 3 per cent) and 15 per cent on the regional vote (up 1 per cent).
This will be a relief for Annabel Goldie, the Conservatives' Scottish leader, who has faced reports of discontent in the Tory camp over her leadership. She
said: "People are responding positively to the Scottish Conservatives and our focus on the everyday issues that really matter to people: crime and drugs, affordable housing, healthcare and childcare."
The poll contains little to enthuse the smaller parties. The Greens are projected to get just one seat because of their failure to break through the magical six per cent figure on the regional list, which would virtually guarantee the return of Green MSPs.
The SSP would end up with possibly a couple of seats but Solidarity does not even do well enough to register one per cent of the vote.
In the 1979 UK general election, Margaret Thatcher pilloried Labour's record in office with the slogan "Labour isn't working". Now it seems the very same slogan sums up Labour's efforts to win the 2007 Scottish election.
Ever since last autumn, the party's campaign has been dominated by one tactic - nat bashing. After all, it seemed to work in the 1999 campaign. In the summer of 1998, the SNP was breathing down Labour's neck. Labour responded with the slogan "Divorce is an expensive business", and by polling day in May 1999 the party was no less than ten points ahead of the SNP on the constituency vote.
Now the story is very different. True, support for independence seems to have fallen back, but this decline has been entirely confined to those supporting one of the unionist parties. The SNP itself has been left unscathed and remains stubbornly ahead on both the constituency and list vote.
Labour has, in truth, made the simplest of mistakes. It has imagined it could win the 2007 election by campaigning in favour of the Union - when what is required is a campaign in favour of the Labour Party. This can clearly be seen if we compare the position in recent months with the situation in the lead-up to the 1999 campaign.
The Nationalists have not been ahead in recent months because of unprecedented levels of support for either independence or the party.
Rather, they are ahead because Labour is in dire straits - its support has consistently been no less than some ten to 14 points lower than at the equivalent stage in 1999.
This time around, the Nationalists are ahead not because of concerns about the Union but because of doubts about the Labour Party.
So, if Labour is to win, it has to overcome those doubts. They are twofold. First, the UK government is highly unpopular. In those circumstances, fighting a campaign that emphasises the partnership between Labour at Holyrood and Labour at Westminster seems entirely misguided.
Labour's second problem only reinforces the need for this approach. In Scottish elections, voters are looking for a party to stand up for Scotland. Yet the electorate has persistently had doubts about Labour on that score.
So far, Jack McConnell has been the campaign's invisible man. He can afford this luxury no longer. Labour needs to fight an effective Holyrood campaign, not a Westminster one dominated by angst about the future of the Union.
John Curtice is professor of politics at Strathclyde University.
The Scottish National Party today (Wednesday) welcomed the result of the latest ICM opinion poll for the Scotsman newspaper which gives the SNP a clear lead on both questions - ahead by 5 points in the constituency vote and 4 points in the regional list vote. [In October 2006, the same poll gave the SNP a 2 point lead on the first question, and level with Labour on the second.]
The poll also shows support for independence ahead, with 46% in favour to 44% against.
The full results of the poll as published this morning are:
Constituency Vote
| SNP | 34% |
| Lab | 29% |
| LibDem | 16% |
| Tory | 16% |
| Green | - |
| SSP | 1% |
| Oth | 3% |
Regional Vote
| SNP | 32% |
| Lab | 28% |
| LibDem | 17% |
| Tory | 15% |
| Green | 4% |
| SSP | 2% |
| Other | 2% |
Angus Robertson MP, the SNP's Campaign Director said:
"We are delighted with this poll. It confirms that the SNP are in the driving seat in this campaign.
"More and more voters are supporting our positive policies to build a successful Scotland. The SNP are working hard to earn the trust of the Scottish people, with policies to make Scotland wealthier, healthier and safer. We are delighted that more and more Scots share our ambition for Scotland.
"We are ahead for three reasons. A positive campaign will always win over a negative campaign, a Scottish campaign will beat a London-based campaign and Alex Salmond is Scotland's choice for First Minister over Mr McConnell.
"Far from Labour closing the gap, as they have been claiming, we are consolidating our lead with only two months to go until polling day.
"Labour's campaign is in substantial disarray.
"Perhaps this explains why Mr McConnell is hiding away rather than publicly debating head to head with Alex Salmond.
"It's time for a fresh approach to meeting Scotland's challenges and opportunities. It's time for an SNP Government with Alex Salmond as First Minister."
ENDS
ICM Research interviewed a random sample of 1,004 Scottish adults aged 18+ by telephone on 23-26 February.
SUPPORT for Scotland becoming independent has been set back, according to the latest poll, but it also shows the Scottish National Party continuing a clear lead over Labour.
The diverging fortunes of the party and its principle cause suggests that Labour has been at least partly successful in damaging the case for independence, having stepped up its campaign on the issue over the past three months.
However, Labour still has to claw back a five-point gap in voting intentions, according to pollsters ICM.
The poll is the first for a month, suggesting the SNP lead, which has crumbled under Labour pressure in previous elections, is holding up relatively well. However, the SNP has carried out its own poll, through YouGov, and has not published the findings as it previously did, raising claims from its opponents that it must be hiding bad news.
On the constituency voting intentions, covering 1004 people between 23 and 26 February, ICM put the SNP on 34%, Labour on 29%, and the Liberal Democrats and Tories each on 16%.
That represents a change on ICM's findings from January of a one point gain for the SNP, two points down for Labour, with the LibDems down one and Tories up three. The smaller parties shared 4%.
Angus Robertson, the Moray MP managing the SNP campaign, said: "We are ahead for three reasons. A positive campaign will always win over a negative campaign, a Scottish campaign will beat a London-based campaign and Alex Salmond is Scotland's choice for First Minister over Mr McConnell."
Cathy Jamieson, Labour's campaign chair, said the poll showed the attack on independence is winning support: "We need to get across the message that you cannot just have a safe vote for the SNP and life will just continue as normal. The SNP would be breaking up rather than building up Scotland."
Commenting on Tony Blair's visit to Aberdeen today (Friday) Alex Salmond MP, leader of the SNP revealed poll figures which show that the SNP has over three times as much support as Mr Blair's party in the North East of Scotland and more support than all the other parties put together.
The poll, conducted by ICM for the Scotsman in February, revealed the following:
SNP 51%
Labour 16%
Tories 15%
Lib Dems 12%
Mr Salmond also highlighted the future opportunities for Scotland north sea oil wealth would bring to Scotland.
Commenting Mr Salmond said:
"Having made a very foolish remark about one of Scotland's most successful businessmen he now takes himself into territory where his party trails the SNP by 35% and it's location as the oil capital of the EU totally undermines his scaremongering tactics.
"In the last six years revenues from oil were £34 billion. For the next six years they will be double that at £68 billion. This offers Scotland a great opportunity for the future and exposes the negative nature of Labour's campaign.
"All that today's visit from Tony Blair has done is focus attention on how the SNP are leading the policy debate with a positive campaign that is gaining support by showing how we can make Scotland a wealthier, healthier, and safer society."
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