THE SNP could take top Scottish Tories Alister Jack and Douglas Ross’s seats at the next General Election and return a huge 51 MPs, a poll has suggested.
With Labour seeing huge gains over the Tories in a number of UK-wide polls that have been released this week, as always the Scottish picture is slightly different.
A survey by Electoral Calculus carried out between September 23-27, of more than 10,400 respondents, showed that if a snap General Election was called, the SNP would win 51 seats gaining three in total.
The Scottish sample of 988 Scots was weighted down to 527 for the UK-wide poll.
There would only be one loss – in Kirkcaldy, where Neale Hanvey, now an Alba MP, was elected on an SNP ticket in 2019. The poll expects the seat would go to Labour.
Former Scottish justice secretary Kenny MacAskill would also see his seat returned to an SNP MP, according to the results.
SNP depute leader Keith Brown said that the SNP are the only ones capable of ridding Scotland of the Tories “for good”, and that it was clear Labour did not need Scottish seats to take over Westminster from the current government.
The Electoral Calculus results showed Labour could pick up a huge 178 seats from the Tories, giving them 381 in total.
The current Tory government has a majority with 365 seats but would lose 191 MPs in one swoop according to the poll, leaving them with 174 representatives.
The LibDems would return 21, the Greens one, and Plaid Cymru four.
On voting intentions, respondents were asked: “If there were a General Election tomorrow, which party if any, would you vote for?”
In Scotland the results showed the SNP winning 51% of the vote, Labour 25%, the Tories 15%, Lib Dems 6%, Scottish Greens 2%, Reform UK 2% and Other 1%.
Both the SNP and Scottish Greens have committed to contesting the next General Election on the grounds of a de-facto indyref2, should the Supreme Court case to allow Holyrood to legislation for an independence poll fail.
The latest poll also showed that the SNP would gain four seats from Douglas Ross, Tory MP in Moray, Alister Jack, Scotland Secretary in Dumfries and Galloway, Andrew Bowie in Aberdeenshire West, and Jamie Stone, LibDem in Caithness and Sutherland.
SNP depute leader Brown said: “After 15 years in power, this poll again demonstrates the solid bond of trust between the people of Scotland and the SNP Scottish Government. But we take nothing for granted, knowing that the only tests of public opinion that really matter are elections.
“The Tories are looking like a busted flush but, as the past shows, they will keep coming back like a toxic boomerang. The only way people in Scotland can really get rid of them for good is with independence.
“Whilst the people of England can get some respite from the Tories for a few years, Scotland can be rid of them for good. Labour doesn’t need Scotland to win. They only have one seat in Scotland and have made themselves irrelevant.”
Two other UK-wide polls showed Labour would return a massive lead over the Tories if the election was brought forward. YouGov showed Keir Starmer’s party on 54%, with Liz Truss’s Tories behind on 21%. Meanwhile, Survation said the 21-point lead they recorded for Labour over the Tories was the largest they’d ever recorded.
Brown added: “If Scotland wants to avoid the harsh lesson of history, repeated time and again for nearly a lifetime, independence is the only way to rid Scotland of the Tories for good.
“We know the SNP is the only party capable of winning all Tory-held seats to remove every last trace of blue from Scotland’s electoral map. Voting Labour instead of the SNP is a risk Scotland can’t afford.
“And you can’t trust Labour anyway - they are in alliance with the Tories in over half a dozen Scottish councils
“Labour has also adopted Tory policies like Brexit, which is damaging the economy and hurting business; and the Brexit effect on immigration is causing NHS staff shortages.
"Scotland can escape those Tory policies with independence and have decisions best suited for the people of Scotland instead of the politicians of Westminster.”
Martin Baxter, CEO of Electoral Calculus: "Our new poll confirms that Liz Truss' government has got off to a dreadful start with the British public.
"The Conservatives won in 2019 partly because Boris Johnson was an electoral asset and Jeremy Corbyn was an electoral liability. That's all changed, and not to the Conservatives' advantage.
"On top of that, the mini-budget, with its unfunded tax cuts, has not been any more popular with voters than it has been with the financial markets."
The Scottish Tories have been contacted for comment.
