Turning a blind eye
As we’ve said before, we really don’t see much point in getting worked up about opinion polls when we’re still more than two years out from any public vote on anything. A new poll by Panelbase has some fairly standard results – the SNP well in front in Holyrood voting intentions (up 2% overall on the 2011 result, with Labour and the Greens both up 1%, and the Tories and Lib Dems down 1.5% each), independence trailing by 9% in a two-way vote with 20% undecided, and the three options (including greater devolution) neck-and-neck when set directly against each other (independence 30, devo-X 29, status quo 28).
While we’re encouraged by these numbers at the height of the Great 2012 Festival Of Britishness, they essentially mean nothing at this point, and don’t tell us anything we haven’t known for months or years already. But what IS mildly interesting is seeing how the Scottish print and online media handles them.
The poll was conducted for the Sunday Times, and presumably appeared in it. (Not being website subscribers we don’t know, and by the time we discovered the poll’s existence it was Monday and too late to go out and buy the real paper.) Better Nation was first off the mark to report it, slightly oddly focusing on the pretty rational seat projections the SNP attached to the figures and crowbarring in a sour, gratuitous and misleading dig at the Scottish Government over the equal-marriage consultation.
(Slightly startlingly, we were actually allowed to post comments pointing that out.)
Scot Goes Pop!, meanwhile, highlighted the continuing gulf in support for independence between men and women, which enabled it to spin with the headline “Majority of men support independence”. The Herald took a similar angle in its coverage, choosing instead the more neutral but slightly curious description “Female vote key to the Union”. (Curious because strictly speaking we’re having a vote on independence, not the Union.)
The paper also ran an interesting analysis on the subject, oddly penned by its Literary Editor rather than a political columnist, which had the rather slanted title of “It’s a good job women are so cautious” but in fact contained a rather more thoughtful assessment in the actual copy, concluding that women aren’t so much opposed to independence as waiting to be convinced by arguments aimed more at an emotional response than an economic one.
As for the rest of the Scottish media and blogosphere, the most telling aspect of their reporting of the poll was that there wasn’t any. Read the Scotsman, the Record or any of the UK broadsheets and blacktops and you’d never know the survey had taken place, unlike recent polls showing lower support for independence which have been front-page splashes all over the Unionist press. We can only assume all their political correspondents are off on their summer holidays. Yes, that must be it.
Surely the BBC on pathetic quay will have covered it, no??
Bang on the money Stuart. For what there worth the polls are looking ok, considering the vote will be in 2 years time. If a week is a long time in politics et al?
To me it demonstrates the degree of panic within the Unionist camp, considering their media puppets will not report the full picture. Coupled with their willingness to participate in blatant scaremongering, means the Union is as good as dead.
Campbells and McDonalds united! How can we lose?
“Campbells and McDonalds united! How can we lose?”
What? Tins of soup in a burger chain!
@Rev Stu
“blacktops”
Is that an official term or did you just make that up?
All the opinion polls that are published have as much validity as the ones conducted by cat food manufacturers which begin “9 out of ten owners who expressed a preference…”. Polls which include the Devo(.*) option are particularly suspect as that option looks increasingly likely never to appear in the referendum. Including the Devo(.*) option seems to be the refuge of the Unionist as it makes their postion look more popular. Make it a clear choice between independence and no change and things wouldn’t look so rosy for the Unionists.
These polls don’t mean anything two years ahead of the vote, but they will be used by politicians to see which route their campaigns may take.
On the one hand I see the YES campaign saying to the undecided and the Devo anything supporters “These Unionists have demanded there is no second question. The only way to get more powers for Scotland, the additional powers you want is to vote YES”
The Unionists should be saying. “You can’t have a devo option on the referendum. We know you want more powers for Scotland, but not full independence so vote agaist independence which is one way of getting more powers and we’ll think about giving you some. Maybe.”
The second is a much harder sell and the Yes campaign should find it much easier to attract support from those in the middle ground.
That might lead to the Unionists allowing a second question and hoping to defeat full independence and then drag out the process of delivering the additonal powers.
That’s worst case scenario for me.
I simply can’t see a straight question ending in a no victory.
I can see maybe a three way question ending in a no win, which would be a nightmare, or a Devo win, which would then take decades to drag additional powers out of Westminster and leave us in an uncertain limbo which could be even worse than a straight no.
After a straight no, we would wait twenty or thirty years and try again. Under a no with Devo, every time the Scots get a little bit rebellious Westminster will produce another Scotland bill, promising more powers, turn it on it’s head, lose it in the Lords for two years, Let Michael Forsyth Pee all over it, and eventually give us something way less than first promised and expect us to be quiet for another fifteen years or so. And they could probably keep that up indefinately, or at least until the oil runs out.
Nightmare.
““blacktops”
Is that an official term or did you just make that up?”
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/british-tabloids.html
LOL.
British tabloids provide their readers a heady concoction of gossip, entertainment and news.
Nice how news is bottom of the agenda….
Reminds me of David Cameron, what was he said about the referendum “Legal, binding and fair.” Struck me at the time that fairness was last on his agenda.
Rev. Stuart Campbell says:
“blacktops”
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/british-tabloids.html
You just “Googled” that one 😉
I will add that to my lexicon. All I need now is a replacement collective term for “broadsheet” as it doesn’t seem appropriate anymore.
I posted a comment in the Herald regarding the Scottish media ignoring the Panel Base/Sunday Times survey.I contrasted this with the blanket coverage of the Ipsos mori poll a few days ago.I also posted a breakdown of the poll.
As I expected it never got published.The Herald are getting worse and worse at this.
They appear to give the aggressive rantings and ravings of a certain M Mckeown free reign, but not allow valid comments about opinion polls and the media.
I’v also challenged Mckeown’s comments and more often than not, they never appear.
Challange the Herald on it. I had a similar problem, emailed them, although it took a couple of try’s, and got a call from someone who sorted it out.
It’ll be very interesting to see how things change once the current insane British Media Blitz winds down to a dribble. 2013 should be a good political battle ground and 2014 should see things swing around to the Yes camp on advantages. It’s 2013-14 is when the polls will get more interesting.
Adam, how did you get it sorted out?
I’ve given up even reading the Herald comments, because I know any foam-flecked rants under the name McKeown will be published, and anything I post maybe 50/50, who knows. And I don’t post unless I have something of substance to say.
How do you sort that out? Keep copies of the posts? Hassle them for an explanation of why they don’t appear? I would have doubted that it would have been worth the effort. What line did you take with them?
To Morag & Adam
It seems the Herald mods have come to their senses, my comment referred to above has now been published, about 8 hours after I wrote it!
Morag – I actually wrote a post specifically for the Herald mods this afternoon.
In short I said there was talk on the blogosphere about their moderating policy, and specifiically mentioned that Mckeown seems to get away with writing lots of inflammatory rubbish, but if you challenged it, you’d often find your response wasn’t published.
Then this evening I found my Panelbase/Sunday Times poll comment was up.
Probably just a coincidence, but they’re ya go.
morag et al,
I am curious why McKeown (West Midlands) appears to write on near enough every Herald politics thread. I’ll stand corrected, but he rarely, if ever, has the dreaded ‘edited by a moderator’ comment against his name. Who exactly is this guy? Enquiring minds in Auchtermuchty demand to know!
My feelings also. I have also, now and again, written posts I suspected might not see the light of day, but for the satisfaction of knowing that at least the moderators would have to read them. I’m not aware of this having any effect.
I also would love to know who this guy is. I know posters on NNS have suggested he is actually a Herald plant, put there either just for the purpose of stirring the pot, or specifically to belittle the independence movement. I really don’t know what to think. I do know he seems to be absolute teflon. Never seen a post edited, and some have contained much more inflammatory comments than posts of mine which have been edited. Of course we can’t know if he has posts rejected, but he has so many accepted that I can’t imagine there would be many.
I also note that he seems to sit there in the early hours, waiting to get the first barbed, nasty, negative comment in right under the article. One morning I actually noticed the timing of his post (after a while this becomes obscured, as it’s just noted as so many days ago) and commented about this habit. My comment wasn’t posted. One has to wonder about someone in England behaving quite so obsessively on the web site of a Scottish newspaper. Wouldn’t he be happier cheerleading Severin Carrell in the Grauniad?
Decades ago, when I wrote to the Herald, they published my letters unedited. Always. More recently, they have been edited in ways to slant my meaning, and apply an obvious editorial bias. This annoys me, so I stopped writing. I thought the web comments might be an acceptable alternative, because surely web comments that were literate and non-abusive would not be edited to apply an editorial bias? But that is exactly what is happening. Unless you’re McKeown, when any bile you feel like spewing will be faithfully reproduced, it seems.
I seldom go to the Herald web site now. McKeown annoys me too much, and I know I won’t be accorded the right of free reply to him. I still buy the actual paper, but I wonder for how much longer. I read the letters page nowadays, and I think, but what did these people actually write? I don’t know.
It’s pernicious, and I wish they would rediscover the honesty I think they had in the 1970s.