BREXIT has undermined support for the SNP rather than boosting backing for independence and made life harder for Nicola Sturgeon, the country’s leading pollster has said.
Professor Sir John Curtice said the SNP’s opposition to Brexit had alienated many Leave voters who had previously supported the party, and cost it dearly in votes.
Around a third of people who voted SNP in the 2016 Holyrood election went on to vote for Brexit a few weeks later, and many of those never returned to the SNP.
SNP support fell most in the working class areas which had voted heavily for Yes in 2014.
"Instead of helping to unite Scotland around the cause of independence, the outcome of the EU referendum potentially threatened the stability of the support base of the SNP,” he said, noting the loss of SNP MPs in the 2017 general election was correlated with Leave voting.
“Rather than creating a bandwagon in favour of independence, Brexit served to expose a fissure in the nationalist movement that Nicola Sturgeon has struggled to straddle. Brexit has, perhaps, turned out to be more of a problem for the First Minister than an opportunity.”
The comments are contained in a report by the academic thinktank The UK in a Changing Europe, which holds a conference on Brexit and devolution today.
The report found Brexit had created significant tensions between Westminster and devolved and local government, and was “inherently disruptive” to the Northern Ireland settlement.
It predicted modern British cities will see a fall in economic output as a result of leaving the EU because of the loss of trade, with Aberdeen the worst affected.
However such cities are also best placed to recover from the hit, and the worst economic impact will be in the “left behind” areas which voted most heavily for Leave.
“Brexit will exacerbate the relative decline experienced in places that voted most heavily for it,” the thinktank said.
Director Professor Anand Menon said: “While the UK’s new relationship with the EU receives almost all the attention, this report sheds light on the domestic challenges that Brexit poses. “MPs and civil servants face significant challenges when it comes to adopting the internal structures of the UK to deal with Brexit.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel