The Sunday National this week posted an article with stats on list votes pitting pro-independence parties against unionist parties. Looking over the number of votes that all pro-indy list parties received (including Greens, SNP, Alba, and others) they lead by a majority of 61,889 votes with 1,372,993 going to independence supporting groups.
EXCLUSIVE: In-depth analysis of every single list vote reveals definitive mandate for indyref2
And here’s the proof 👇
List votes for anti-independence parties (1/3)
List votes for parties that were neutral or non-committal on independence (2/3)
List votes for pro-independence parties (3/3)
Originally tweeted by Sunday National (@SunScotNational) on May 16, 2021.
Sadly with the way that the D’hont system works this doesn’t result in an overwhelming Pro-Indy majority in the Scottish parliament. Due to the majority of those list votes going to the SNP and them picking up many constituency seats, most of those SNP list votes are completely disregarded allowing more unionist parties into parliament. There is only a pro-indy majority thanks to the Greens propping up the SNP and as we know the Greens are lukewarm towards independence as it is.
If a majority of Scottish voters have voted for it and we have a Pro-Independence Scottish Government then surely we should be negotiating this now or at the very least steps being taken to get us there. We have had a pro-Independence administration in the Scottish parliament for the past 5 years with the cause no further forward despite the result of the Brexit vote and a renewed mandate from a snap general election. We were told that Scotland would not be dragged out of the EU against its will and yet here we are still under Westminster rule and outside of the European Union.
It is very unlikely we will see IndyRef2 within this term of the Scottish parliament, there aren’t any parties in SP pushing for it. Independence isn’t something that will just land in our laps it will take effort and will need to be fought for. Scottish independence used to be the primary goal of the SNP but now the party is trying to be all things to all people while the Greens just aren’t that fussed about it. That’s not to say that there are not passionate independence supporters within the SNP because there are, but with a lack of push for it from the leadership it is hard to see the SNP as the party of Scottish Independence.
It is difficult to take these voting numbers as definitive support for independence when (other than the conservatives with their “Stop IndyRef2” campaign) the parties with the most votes didn’t fight the election on Independence. The only way we will see any movement towards Indy or IndyRef2 is if we start seeing more representation from parties who are making this their priority, parties like Alba.