In the run-up to this month’s Scottish Independence Referendum, startling new figures about voting intentions have emerged.
We are not talking about YouGov’s results published yesterday, but the latest not-stricty-reliable monthly poll conducted by Cuckoo’s Bakery on Dundas Street.
Based on purchases of politically themed cupcakes up to 28 August, the gap between those intending to vote Yes and No has narrowed to 1.3%.
The figures in detail break down as follows:
Yes: 45.3%
No: 46.6%
Undecided: 8.1%
Since the last set of figures appeared on 8 August, these results show gains of 5.6% for Yes, and 5.4% for No.
Back on 2 May, when Cuckoo Bakery's findings first caught our attention, Yes cupcake purchases for the previous month stood at 27.7%, Nos at 54.9%, and Undecideds at 17.4%.
Better Together supporters are likely to find the latest statistics unswallowable rather than unpalatable. For Yes supporters, the figures are merely the icing on the cake in what has been an encouraging couple of weeks.
A senior pro-Union politician encountered by Spurtle at a bus stop on Monday – only yards from Cuckoo's – surprisingly failed to mention the cupcake conundrum in our brief discussion of the Referendum campaign.
Instead, he expressed pleasure at the positive response Better Together’s case had met with on Edinburgh doorsteps, but conceded that judging that response on the basis of previous political doorstep experience was of little use. This referendum has no recent precedent.
He seemed more concerned at a mass pro-Union rally by Orangemen on 13 September. The PR effect of an estimated 10,000–15,000 brethren arriving in the capital, some from Northern Ireland, he described as ‘potentially not very helpful’.