Professor John Robertson OBA

From: Scottish Social Attitudes | 25 years of devolution in Scotland: Public attitudes and reactions published last week: https://natcen.ac.uk/publications/scottish-social-attitudes-25-years-devolution-scotland

Figure 15, meanwhile, analyses the relationship between where people stand on our left-right scale and their constitutional preference. To construct this figure, we have for each of our yearly samples identified the one-third of respondents whose score on our scale puts them among the one-third most left-wing in that year, those whose score puts them among the one-third most right wing, with the remaining one-third in between. The figure shows that, from the outset of devolution, those on the left were somewhat more likely than those on the right to support independence. However, in the first year for which we have a measure, 2000, the gap between the two groups was a relatively modest one of 15 points. Though it fluctuated somewhat thereafter, it was still no more than 11 points in 2012. However, by 2015, support for independence stood at 52% among those on the left, compared with just 24% among those on the right – a difference of 28 points. It seems that the argument during the referendum campaign that an independent Scotland might be a more equal country may well have proven particularly persuasive among those on the left. In any event, the widened gap is still in evidence. In our most recent survey in 2024, those on the left were 34 points more likely than those on the right to say that Scotland should become an independent country. The debate about Scotland’s constitutional status is not just a debate about where power should lie but has also come to reflect to a greater extent how people believe power should be exercised.

Grok AI agrees:

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