TACTICAL voting for the Scottish Greens on the Holyrood list cost the SNP an overall majority, and may have made independence less likely, a new survey has suggested.

Pollsters found around half of those who voted Green on the list did so wanting to elect as many pro-independence MSPs as possible, rather than actively supporting the party.

However the result was to leave the SNP one short of a majority, making it easier for Boris Johnson to refuse Nicola Sturgeon the power to hold another referendum.

The Greens won a record eight seats on May 6 while the SNP won 64 out of 129.

A new analysis for Gordon Brown’s Our Scottish Future campaign found if half the Green list vote had gone to the SNP, the Greens would have won two MSPs and the SNP 67.

The study also found that if the SNP had won key target seats they missed because of pro-Union tactical voting, including Dumbarton and Eastwood, they would have achieved an overall majority despite the swings and roundabouts of the proportional system.

Alex Salmond's Alba party put the idea of tactical voting for pro-Independence MSPs at their heart of its campaign, but voters rejected it while the Green list vote went up.

The work was done by Stack Data Strategy, a newly formed offshoot of Hanbury Strategy and Communications, which has deep ties to the Tory party and the Brexit campaign.

Mr Brown, Labour Prime Minister from 2007 to 2010, this month converted Our Scottish Future from a thinktank into a campaign aimed at the swing voters of ‘Middle Scotland’.

His appeal is to persuade the 40 per cent of Scots who hare neither diehard Unionists of Nationalists, but are likely to vote Yes if presented with a binary choice in Indyref2, to stick with the United Kingdom. 

READ MORE: Iain Macwhirter: Nicola Sturgeon's Cabinet reshuffle is more of a recycle

The organisaton commissioned a ‘morning after poll’ of 1000 Scots to ask why they voted and what they wanted from the UK and Scottish Governments over the next five years.

The poll also found 54% of SNP voters agreed with starting work on Indyref2 immediately and around a fifth of SNP voters were either against or unsure about independence.

The wary 20% cited the party’s policies and Ms Sturgeon’s leadership for voting SNP.

The poll also found Scotland remains divided 50/50 on whether to back independence, with many voters want the recovery from the pandemic addressed first.

Report authors Henry Stannard and Evie Robertson said: “There a third ‘Middle’ Scotland that neither conforms to a binary Pro-Union or Pro-Independence view of the world, but that is greater in size than either of the extremes in the constitutional debate. 

“Citizens in this Middle Scotland are both primarily Scottish and meaningfully British. 

“They vote in their droves for the SNP not because they want a referendum, but because the SNP appear to offer good leadership and government within a devolved state. 

“They do not oppose a referendum in principle but have deep concerns over its practicality that must be resolved.”

Our scottish Future said it would also publish the results of “a major consultation exercise carried out this winter and spring with Yes and No voters”, which sought to find out what they had in common and what they agree on the next steps for Scotland and the constitution.

Scottish Green co-leader Patrick Harvie said: “Better Together are so blinded by their bitter, jaded constitutional angst they cannot recognise the Scottish Green Party as a distinctive party, with our own voter base, one which we grew all over the country after a positive campaign on our own vision for the future of Scotland.

“Just because the unionist parties spent six weeks talking about tactical voting doesn’t mean they should frame the election in such a narrow way.

"It makes no sense at all to highlight some SNP voters who aren’t convinced about independence, but then pretend without a shred of evidence that every Green voter is voting tactically on the constitution alone.”