Just days before Rishi Sunak’s bizarrely soggy general election call, the latest YouGov poll gave Labour a lead of 39% to just 29% for the SNP. That would decimate the SNP at Westminster and let Keir Starmer claim to speak for Britain (if not the whole UK).
But it’s only one poll. Can the new Swinney/Forbes leadership team, plus Stephen Flynn at Westminster, change the dynamics in the next six weeks or is the SNP’s time up?
Some of the omens are not good. In the same YouGov poll, 58-62% of voters “have little to no confidence in the SNP to make the right decisions on the economy, health service, schools, police and climate change”. And the distinction between reserved and devolved policies, or whether issues are for the Scottish parliament or Westminster, doesn’t stop voters prioritising them in their choice of party in a general election. But other polls are less discouraging – Labour and the SNP were still neck and neck in mid-April polling.