GIRL POWER
Risks of Brexit and coronavirus are driving more cautious voters to favour exiting UK
Women are driving increased support for Scottish independence because they now view it as the least risky option, it has been claimed.
In the run- up to the 2014 referendum, males were far more likely to vote to break from the UK than females.
But recent polls suggest that trend has now been eliminated, with overall support as high as 55 per cent, according to a Panelbase survey in August.
Heinz Brandenburg, a senior professor of pol it ics at Strathclyde University, believes a fundamental shift in the gender divide is being dr iven by the perceived risk created by a chaotic Brexit and coronavirus.
He said: “At the time of thehe 2014 referendum, there were studies that showed people cautious in their general attitudes to life were less likely to vote yes and people more comfortable with riskk were more likely to votee yes.
“That makes sensee because independence iss a plunge into the dark too some extent.
“There is also a lot of psychological research thatat would suggest men arere more risk prone – if you haveve two policy options and onene has much more risk, you can be sure it will be the one preferred by men and vice versa. During the referendum, and certainly for four years afterwards, there was a big gender gap of up to 10 per cent between male and female support for indindependence. But something has haphappened now – if you loolook at almost every polpoll since 2020, support for independence now cocomes as strongly from wowomen and men. “That change is sosomething that is exextremely rare. One exexample would be in AAmerica where you had women in the 50s and 60 s be in and 60 s being more conservative and more likely to vote for Republicans.
“But, over the last 20 years, that has shifted and women are now more likely to support Democrats.
“But that took decades. Here, we are seeing something that has happened in the space of a year, where the gender gap seems to have flipped.”
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon told MSPs earlier this month that a draft Bill will be drawn up setting out the timing, terms and question for a new referendum.
Polls suggest support has now been the majority view for much of 2020.
Brandenburg added: “With coronavirus, you have seen a strong female leader who has appeared to show more empathy and competence, and that has perhaps had an impact.
“But part of it must be that Brexit has created such a lot of uncertainty, and the fact that we increasingly don’t know what it is going to look like has meant that the risk of independence is weighed against complete uncertainty.
“It used to be that voting for independence was weighed against something that seemed stable and consistent but that is no longer the case.
“It seems likely that this has been a factor in the increased support among women.”