Scottish Independence?

I was having a conversation with a mate the other night about what Brexit means for Scottish independence. This mate, however, is an American. Because when American politics are depressing and nonsensical, we turn to British pol—wait, never mind.

Despite the overall UK vote to leave the European Union, Scotland (and London, and Northern Ireland) voted overwhelmingly to remain. But since part of the whole vote no to independence thing was remaining part of the EU thing, shouldn’t Scotland now be well positioned for IndyRef2?

I read this article from the Guardian back in January and meant to share it with you all, but I somehow forgot about it. So at long last, it turns out no, not so much. The whole thing is worth a read; it uses YouGov survey data to break out voters into different camps. And what sort of nails the argument is this graphic.

About that independence…
About that independence…

There are four/five groups of Brexit/IndyRef1 voters that then get sorted into two/three IndyRef2 results (yes, no, maybe I don’t know?). And what you can see is that yes, a significant number of those who voted to Remain in the EU, but voted no to Scottish independence would now vote for independence. But, an almost equal number of those who voted to Remain and also voted for Scottish independence would now vote against Scottish independence. In effect, these two voter movements are cancelling out any potential gains for a future Scottish independence vote.

Credit for the piece goes to the YouGov graphics department.

2016 Holyrood Elections

Last week Scotland voted for its parliament, Holyrood. The Scottish National Party did well enough, the Conservatives picked up quite a few seats, and Labour lost quite a few. The Guardian put together this piece looking at the results and the stories contained therein. But I want to focus on the graphics, the big piece of which was a map of Scotland with each constituency represented by a small Sankey diagram.

Scotland's results
Scotland’s results

You see that generally, Scotland is a sea of yellow, surging blue, and diminishing red. But what about the numbers for each constituency? The interactive nature of the chart lets you see the 2016 results mousing over the constituency.

Aberdeenshire West results
Aberdeenshire West results

Normally I would say that a piece like this is missing an easy way for someone to find their own constituency, however, this is not a results page, but an article on the results, so something like a search bar is not necessary.

What I really enjoy, however, is that when the story breaks down the results by regions, the map becomes an abstracted series of squares used to highlight the constituencies in focus. It is a really nice reuse of the concept and the overall graphic.

Talking about Glasgow
Talking about Glasgow

Credit for the piece goes to the Guardian’s graphics department.

English Votes for English Laws

Last week the British government announced plans to solve the West Lothian Question that centres on devolution parity for England. Many legislative powers have been devolved from London and given to the regional parliaments in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. And on the one hand that is great as the national parliament no longer tells Scottish schools what to do, which is important because of England’s clout in London because England is by far the largest part of the Union. But the on the other hand, Scottish, Welsh, and Northern Irish MPs still get to vote on schools in England. You can begin to see how the English feel that is unfair.

So the BBC put together this graphic trying to explain what was announced, because it is far more complicated than just giving England its own parliament. It’s a tricky and complicated issue that is worth a read. If only because the government apparently did not realise that its plan can be acronymised to EVEL.

It's EVEL I tell you. Pure EVEL.
It’s EVEL I tell you. Pure EVEL.

Credit for the piece goes to the BBC graphics department.

Scotland Votes

By the time this post goes live, Scotland will have already been voting on independence for several hours. At the time of writing this post, it appears more a toss-up than anything else. And so today we highlight a piece that is a little bit different than what I might normally cover. Here we have a long-form piece from the BBC that looks at how different trends across recent decades of history have converged at this point in time to give Scotland this choice.

Scotland's Decision
Scotland’s Decision

Credit for the overall piece goes to Allan Little, Paul Kerley, Finlo Rohler, Jonathan Duffy, Kevin McKeown, Darren McLarkey, Marcelo Zanni, Sally Morales, Giles Wilson, and the opening illustration (the screen capture) is Cognitive Media.