People in Scotland really don’t like the British parties and their leaders – but how come their leaders are less popular than their parties?

British pollsters are unsurprisingly much more interested in Westminster than Holyrood. Getting up-to-date data about what people in Scotland think is harder to get. But IPSOS produces an interesting occasional “Scotland Political Pulse”. Here’s what I found out from its latest release.

(click for more detail)

“Net favourability” is the difference between whether those asked feel favourable or unfavourable towards a person or party – how popular they are. A negative number means on average people feel mostly unfavourable.

It’s clear that, compared to the leaders of British parties, that John Swinney – and the SNP – are much the most popular. This is despite the British media, including the BBC in Scotland, generally giving them wall-to-wall negative coverage.

The other point to note is that John Swinney is more popular than his party. In his role as First Minister his job is to lead all in Scotland – so you’d hope this would be the case.

What about the British parties? In the Scottish Parliament the Conservative Party is currently the Opposition. Its leader in Scotland is very unpopular – but not as much as its leader in Westminster. Kemi Badenoch is currently the least popular leader in Scotland. At least Russell Findlay is more popular than his party: generally the leaders of British parties in Scotland try to distance themselves from HQ in England, and for Findlay this appears to have worked.

Now let’s look at Labour. Performing better than the traditional right-wing parties, but Ana Sarwar will be very disappointed. Virtually all of Labour’s online ad spend in Scotland goes on promoting Sarwar. He’s very keen to become Scotland’s First Minister next year. On this showing that looks unlikely.

Both Sarwar and his party boss Keir Starmer are less popular than their party – which isn’t too impressive. What’s less impressive is that even Russell Findlay beats Starmer on popularity in Scotland.

Finally there’s Reform UK. It doesn’t have a leader in Scotland – because, of course, it doesn’t recognise Scotland as being distinct from Britain. It’s leader Nigel Farage is only just saved from being least popular leader in Scotland by Kemi Badenoch (-43% vs -44%). And Farage is less popular than his party.

I’m not sure the party has got the message to him though. Still, when you own the company, I guess objectivity goes out the window.

It’s not a science

Vote share predictions tend to match leader popularity. Policies were only a minor consideration in Scotland in determining party choice at the Westminster 2024 election. Are we doomed to the cult of personality in Scottish politics?

The British media may like good click-bait headlines – and party leaders do tend to provide them – but at a local level candidates from Scottish parties like The SNP and Scottish Greens are more concerned about their local communities, Scotland’s priorities, and how independence can ultimately benefit them. Policies do matter.

Scottish parties may promote popular messages rather than their party leaders, but you won’t be hearing any of that from Westminster parties any time soon. Their HQ campaign teams will see to that.