SCOTLAND has two governments, the Tories constantly tell us. To which the obvious reply is: “It’s a pity we only elected one of them.” But presumably the point is meant to be that both governments are equally committed to serving Scotland and acting in the country’s best interests.
Is that how the people of Scotland actually see it, though? There’s rarely been a bigger test of whether the UK Government is capable of taking proper account of Scotland’s needs than the recent negotiations over the post-Brexit trade deal, because our interests plainly differed from the rest of the UK in a number of key respects – most notably the relative importance of our fishing industry, and the seed potato sector. Do voters feel that Boris Johnson’s team dutifully championed those priorities, even if it was (self-evidently) to very little avail?
To find out, I used the new Scot Goes Pop/Survation poll to ask respondents whether they felt the UK Government had given greater priority in the negotiations to Scottish interests, to English interests, or to both equally. The “Scottish interests” option was there for balance, but realistically the choice was always going to be between “English interests” and “both equally” – and the fact that most people looking at the question would have instantly realised that is in itself a decent illustration of the problem.
READ MORE: Scots are already willing to abandon Plan A and push for indy, poll suggests
In the end, the damning verdict was returned, rather than the neutral one. Even if don’t-knows are left in, an absolute majority (53%) of respondents said that the UK Government had given greatest weight to English interests. A mere 13% said that Scottish interests had been prioritised, while 24% chose the “both equally” option. Pretty much the only demographic or political group to give Westminster the benefit of the doubt were Conservative voters, 61% of whom thought that British negotiators had taken an even-handed approach. Other than that, it was practically a clean sweep. Men, women, SNP voters, Labour voters, Liberal Democrat voters, every age group, every region – they all felt by a sizeable margin that English interests had come first. Of greatest concern to the Tories may be the finding that even 40% of Leave voters from the 2016 EU referendum thought that England was the priority.
If a substantial segment of the minority of Scottish voters who actually supported Brexit are already suffering from buyer’s remorse due to a perception that Scotland has been shortchanged in the new dispensation, there’s an obvious possibility that support for independence could increase further.
A strong clue as to why Scottish voters seem to have concluded that their country was treated as an afterthought can be found in the result of another question from the poll. After the exclusion of don’t-knows, 69% of respondents said that the deal is bad for the Scottish fishing industry, and only 31% said that it’s good.
A spin war has raged since the deal was signed, with Tories claiming that it’s a fair compromise that will slightly improve access for Scottish boats in the short-term and will lead to all of the advantages of being “an independent coastal state” in the long-term, while the SNP counter that Boris Johnson has sold the Scottish industry down the river upon leaving Europe in much the same way that Edward Heath did upon entry.
It looks very much like the latter interpretation has gained more traction with the public. Even a narrow plurality of Conservative voters think the deal is bad for Scottish fishing – and that could be a very ominous sign for the Tories’ chances in the forthcoming Holyrood election, particularly in their target coastal seats of Moray and Banffshire and Buchan Coast.
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